Bitcoin miner Rhodium set for IPO, valued at $1.7 billion

January 18, 2022 Coin Telegraph

Bitcoin miner Rhodium set for IPO, valued at .7 billion

The Initial Public Offering (IPO) for Texas-based Bitcoin miner Rhodium Enterprises is another feather in the cap for the Bitcoin-friendly southern State.

The first IPO for the crypto industry in 2022 comes from a Texas-based Bitcoin (BTC) mining company, Rhodium Enterprises.

In an SEC filing made last week, Rhodium plans to offer 7.69 million shares at $12-$14 each in an initial public offering (IPO). Trading under the ticker “RHDM” on Nasdaq, 56.8 million class A and 67.5 million class B shares will be released, ultimately valuing the company at just shy of $1.7 billion.

Rhodium is a cryptocurrency technology company that uses proprietary tech and liquid cooling technology to self-mine Bitcoin. Their goal is to be the most sustainable and cost-efficient producer of Bitcoin in the industry.

The company joins a growing list of US-based companies that mine Bitcoin. Over the past three years, Marathon, Bitdeer Technologies, Riot Blockchain, and Bit Digital listed on stock exchanges such as NASDAQ.

According to the filing, Rhodium currently runs 125 megawatts (MW) of mining power capacity at its first Texas site. 33,600 Bitcoin miners are running, churning out a total combined hash rate capacity of approximately 2.7 EH/s.

Following the IPO and a raise of $100 million capital, it will run a second site in Texas where they "expect to develop 225 MW of additional capacity." By the end of 2022, the company will effectively more than double its current capacity.

Bearing in mind that the average cost per BTC in 2021 was about $47,000, their electricity cost basis is staggering:

Our infrastructure platform allows us to mine Bitcoin at a significantly lower cost compared to the industry average. For the period from January 1. 2021, to September 30. 2021, our average electricity cost to produce one Bitcoin was approximately $2,507.

Texas continues to carve out a reputation as a Bitcoin mining-friendly state. In quarter four of 2021, Senator Ted Cruz commented that Texas should use Bitcoin mining to capture wasted natural gas while the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) anticipated that Texan Bitcoin mining power demands could jump 5 times by 2023.

Rhodium takes advantage of Texas’ “independent power market and abundance of low-cost renewable energy resources,” and pro-Bitcoin business environment.

Given the company’s experience with liquid-cooling technology and efficiency; for tiny Bitcoin miners seeking to solve valid blocks, it just got a bit harder.

Bitcoin Mining Company Griid Plans for Public Listing on NYSE via SPAC Deal

November 30, 2021 Bitcoin.com

India’s crypto unicorn CoinDCX has no immediate plans for IPO

November 29, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Coin Telegraph

CoinDCX reached a $1.1 billion valuation by raising $90 million in a Series C funding round in August.

India’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, CoinDCX, has no immediate plans for a public listing as the regulatory environment in the country remains uncertain.

CoinDCX has no definitive route or clause as to when to go ahead with a potential initial public offering (IPO), the firm told Cointelegraph in an official statement on Nov. 29.

“Any growing company aspires to take an IPO route in due course. We at CoinDCX also have similar aspirations. We would like to reiterate that there is no immediate plan in the foreseeable future to announce an IPO,” a spokesperson said.

The latest announcement adds to the claims of CoinDCX co-founder Neeraj Khandelwal who earlier today claimed that CoinDCX would pursue an IPO “as soon as the government or the situations allow” the exchange to do so. Khandelwal said in a Bloomberg interview that CoinDCX would decide on a “precise timeline” depending on upcoming government regulations.

The spokesperson for CoinDCX emphasized that the focus of the Bloomberg interview was to “discuss the regulatory framework in India about the crypto bill being tabled in the parliament.”

CoinDCX is one of the largest crypto companies in India. In August, CoinDCX raised $90 million in a Series C funding round, becoming the first crypto business in India to reach unicorn status.

According to local reports, India’s finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman declared on Nov. 29 that the government has no plans to recognize Bitcoin (BTC) as a currency. She also noted that the government does not collect data on Bitcoin transactions.

The latest news follows years of uncertainty around cryptocurrency regulation in India as the industry remains unregulated after the central bank of India attempted to ban crypto in 2018. Earlier this year, several supposed government-linked sources stoked fears of another upcoming crypto ban, suggesting that the Indian government was planning to impose a blanket ban on the industry.

Crypto miner PrimeBlock reportedly plans to go public through 10X Capital merger

November 18, 2021 Coin Telegraph

10x capital

The merger could result in a valuation of the two firms at roughly $1.5 billion following a $150 million fundraising round from 10X Capital Venture.

Prime Blockchain, also known as PrimeBlock, is reportedly preparing for a public offering in the United States through a special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.

In a Thursday report, Bloomberg said Bitcoin (BTC) mining firm PrimeBlock is currently discussing going public in the U.S. through a merger with 10X Capital Venture Acquisition Corp II. Though the terms of the deal are reportedly not yet finalized, the merger could result in a valuation of the two firms at roughly $1.5 billion following a $150 million fundraising round from the venture capital firm.

A crypto mining company based in the United States, PrimeBlock rolled out its first operations in Tennessee and North Carolina in September. The firm announced on Nov. 4 it had appointed Goldman Sachs veteran Gaurav Budhrani as the company’s CEO and former tZERO chief legal officer Alan Konevsky as its CLO.

As of Nov. 4, PrimeBlock reported it held more than 10,300 rigs equipped for BTC mining, as well as 2,600 Ether (ETH) miners. According to Bloomberg, the company currently mines roughly five BTC daily operating at a hashrate of one exahash.

Other crypto firms have used the SPAC route to go public in the United States. In March, Bitfury's U.S. subsidiary Cipher Mining said it would be merging with Good Works Acquisition Corp as part of a $2 billion deal to become a publicly listed company. Bitcoin miner Core Scientific is also set for a public listing on Nasdaq following a $4.3 billion merger with Power and Digital Infrastructure Acquisition Corp.

Cointelegraph reached out to PrimeBlock, but did not receive a response at the time of publication.

Novogratz’s crypto firm Galaxy Digital delays US stock listing to 2022

November 16, 2021 Coin Telegraph

BitGo

After initiating the BitGo acquisition in May, Galaxy Digital expects to close the deal in the first three months of 2022.

Galaxy Digital Holdings, Mike Novogratz’s cryptocurrency investment management firm, is not going public in the United States in late 2021 as the firm previously planned.

Galaxy Digital has postponed plans for a U.S. listing, now expecting to go public in the first quarter of 2022, the company’s founder and CEO, Novogratz, announced Monday.

“We look forward to our U.S. listing and the close of our BitGo acquisition, which we now expect will occur in the first quarter of 2022,” he said.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is yet to approve Galaxy Digital’s potential listing on an American exchange, Galaxy reportedly said.

Novogratz’s crypto investment manager is also still in the process of closing the acquisition of cryptocurrency custodian BitGo after initiating the purchase earlier this year. The acquisition is expected to close in the first three months of 2022.

Galaxy Digital officially announced the company’s plans for a U.S. listing in May, with Novogratz expecting the firm to go public in the U.S. in the second half of 2021. The firm did not immediately respond to Cointelegraph’s request for comment.

One of the largest crypto investment companies in the world, Galaxy Digital has already been trading on a major Canadian stock exchange. The company debuted its first-ever listing on Toronto’s TSX Venture Exchange in August 2018 after acquiring local crypto startup Coin Capital.

Trading under the ticker symbol GLXY, Galaxy Digital’s stock has posted significant growth recently, surpassing $40 for the first time last week. At the time of writing, the stock is trading at $41, up around 0.2% over the past 24 hours, according to TSX data.

*Source: Toronto’s TSX Venture Exchange*

The news comes amid Galaxy Digital announcing its Q3 financial results on Monday. Its net comprehensive income surged to as high as $517 million from $42 million over the same period last year. Galaxy Digital also reported that it managed $3.2 billion in assets as of October 2021.

“As the crypto economy continues to mature and adoption trends accelerate, driving both asset price increases and greater quantities of institutional capital into the space, I have never been more bullish about the future of our Company,” Novogratz added.

DEXs growing faster than CEXs but Binance still sees 171M visitors in a month

November 11, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Binance

According to Chainalysis data the number of DEX’s doubled between Q1 2019 and Q3 2021, while the amount of CEX’s stayed around the same.

A new Chainalysis report shows that the number of decentralized exchanges (DEXs) is growing faster than all other types of crypto exchanges. But Similar Web data shows centralized exchanges are far from unpopular, with Binance seeing 171 million visitors in October.

Chainalysis published a report on crypto exchanges on Nov. 11 and provided an analysis by breaking the exchanges down by their business models including DEXs, CEXs, over-the-counter (OTC) brokers, derivatives platforms and high-risk exchanges with minimal know your customer (KYC) requirements.

According to the data, the number of DEX’s between Q1 2019 and Q3 2021 increased more than 100% to sit at around 205 as of June this year. In comparison, the number of CEX’s temporarily increased from around 100 to 120, before dipping back to the 100 region within that time frame.

The amount of OTC brokers also increased significantly, gaining around 50% to sit at the 150 mark in Q3 2021. The number of derivatives exchanges got a slight bump to around 125 in 2019, and has essentially held at the region since, while high-risk exchanges broke out during the middle of 2020 to around the 150 mark, before sharply dropping below 100 in Q3 2021.

*Growth of active crypto exchanges: Chainalysis*

“Of course, the number of active exchanges in each category isn’t the only way to judge the health of those categories. After all, cryptocurrency businesses aren’t simply trying to survive — they need to grow their userbases and transaction volumes in order to thrive,” the report said.

Across all categories however, the number of small exchanges has dropped, suggesting the exchange market can no longer support niche players. The lesson? Exchanges need to reach a mass audience, or a small audience of large-scale traders, in order to stay in business.
— Chainalysis (@chainalysis) November 10, 2021

Chainalysis emphasized that the growing popularity of DEXs over the past two years has coincided with the “explosive growth of the DeFi category in general.” The firm highlighted that the total value received by DEX’s grew from around $10 billion in July 2020 to a peak of $368 million in May 2021, marking an increase of roughly 3579%.

Binance is still the top dog

Despite facing intense scrutiny and pushback from regulators across the globe in recent months, data shows that the centralized exchange Binance still towers over its competitors.

According to data from Similar Web compiled by Finbold, Binance had the most web traffic out of all crypto exchanges in October with a total of 171 million visitors. The figure represents a 12% increase compared to the month before. Coinbase ranks second with 91 million visitors last month, and had a 31% surge in traffic compared to the month before.

Notably the third most popular exchange is PancakeSwap, a DEX that operates on the Binance Smart Chain, with 25 million visitors and a 14% month-over-month increase. While Bybit sits at fourth with 24 million (down 8% from September).

Coingecko data shows that Binance is well ahead of its competitors in terms of volume, with the platform seeing more than $33.3 billion over the past 24 hours. That figure is more than five times larger than the total of second-ranked Coinbase, which generated $6.6 billion worth of 24-volume.

On Thursday the Wall Street Journal reported that former Binance executives estimated that the firm could be worth up to $300 billion as a publicly-traded company. It is unclear when or how Binance will go public, considering its lack of a formal headquarters. However, CEO Changpeng Zhao said in September the Binance’s U.S. branch was looking at an initial public offering (IPO) in 2024.

Cathie Wood’s ARK snaps up $80M Robinhood shares after crypto led price dip

October 29, 2021 Coin Telegraph

<div>Cathie Wood's ARK snaps up M Robinhood shares after crypto led price dip</div>

ARK

Ark Investment took the opportunity to buy Robinhood shares at a discount following the trading company's unsatisfactory earnings report.

ARK Invest, the investment management firm focused on innovative tech led by Cathie Wood, took advantage of a dip in the price on Wednesday to buy nearly $80 million worth of Robinhood stock.

As per daily trading data, Wood’s ARK purchased a total of 2.24 million shares of Robinhood across three of Ark’s ETF funds, with the majority of shares going to the flagship fund ARK Innovation ETF. Robinhood now accounts for 1.33% of the Innovation ETF.

On Oct. 27, the trading platform had declared a 78% decline in crypto revenue — from $233 million in Q2 to $51 million in Q3 — which drove the share price down below its July IPO price of $38.

The stock is down more than -11% since the start of the week, from $39.85 on Monday 25 Oct. to $35.47 as of market close Thursday 28 Oct.

Following the earnings report analysts at JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, Piper Sandler, Barclays and Deutsche Bank reduced their price targets significantly.

Earlier in the week, Ark sold a total of 57,106 shares of Tesla stock, worth $59 million, when the electric carmaker crossed the $1 trillion valuation.

Ark also bought the dip with $60M in Twitter stock on Wednesday after the social media company revealed diminishing user growth in its earnings report, causing the stock price to depreciate almost 11%.

Wood still has reasons to believe in Robinhood’s progress in crypto as more than 1 million people are on the waitlist for the app’s crypto wallet, albeit as that's the only way to withdraw crypto from the platform.

In early October, the trading app also introduced a 24/7 support line to improve customer service wait times and help users with crypto investments.

Although Wood passed on buying the first Bitcoin futures ETF she still remains bullish on crypto. Ark Invest partnered with 21 Shares to file for its own Bitcoin ETF in June.

Mining Giant Bitfury Confirms Plans for an IPO

October 18, 2021 The Crypto Briefing

Bitfury CEO confirms IPO considerations are part of expansion plans

October 18, 2021 Coin Telegraph

BitFury

In 2018, Bitfury raised $80 million from investors like Michael Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital at a $1 billion valuation.

Bitfury, one of the world’s largest companies in the blockchain industry, is mulling a potential initial public offering, or IPO, as part of the company’s global growth plans, the company’s CEO confirmed to Cointelegraph.

“As Bitfury and its portfolio of companies continue their global expansion in the digital assets space, Bitfury will be considering an IPO as part of its broader expansion and growth plans,” Bitfury co-founder and CEO Valery Vavilov said.

According to the executive, Bitfury has not yet determined when and on what exchange the company is willing to proceed with an IPO. The company’s last funding round took place in 2018, with Bitfury raising $80 million at a $1 billion valuation.

Bitfury’s investors include European venture capital fund Korelya Capital, South Korean internet giant Naver Group, Asian institutions Macquarie Capital and Dentsu Japan as well as Michael Novogratz’s crypto investment company Galaxy Digital.

British news agency The Telegraph originally reported on Bitfury’s potential IPO plans on Oct. 10, citing anonymous sources claiming that Bitfury tapped Big Four accounting firm Deloitte to review its readiness for going public. The publication noted that Bitfury operates its main headquarters in the Netherlands but it is legally based in the United Kingdom. Bitfury did not immediately comment on its legal headquarters to Cointelegraph.

Founded back in 2011, Bitfury is a major company in the industry, operating a wide number of services like crypto mining hardware design, software, semiconductor chips’ manufacturing as well as running mobile data centers. The company’s United States-based Bitcoin mining subsidiary, Cipher Mining, was valued at over $2 billion as of March 2021.

Apart from focusing on cryptocurrency mining, Bitfury has been actively working on cryptocurrency security, blockchain research and compliance, running platforms like Crystal Blockchain, LiquidStack and the most recent spin-off Axelera AI. The firm is also a software provider for some global applications through its Exonum private blockchain framework, which was trialed for Russia’s blockchain-based voting system in 2020

Bitcoin miner Stronghold will list almost 6M shares in its $100M IPO

October 14, 2021 Coin Telegraph

Bitcoin

The firm uses a sustainable energy source by converting waste coal into power to mine Bitcoin.

U.S. Bitcoin mining company Stronghold Digital Mining will list almost six million shares in an initial public offering on the Nasdaq.

Stronghold plans to list 5,882,352 Class A common stock shares priced between $16 and $18 under the ticker “SDIG”. Taking the average proposed offering price puts the IPO at around $100 million.

The Kennerdell, Pennsylvania-based firm first filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a Nasdaq IPO in July. It will fund an almost 900% expansion in capacity in the coming year. The final prospectus has already been filed with the SEC, but it has yet to become effective.

Stronghold plans to become the first North American crypto mining company to go public through an actual IPO, according to Nasdaq. This is different from the now popular direct listing and Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPAC) avenues.

Stronghold intends to grant underwriters, or intermediaries that help the firm prepare for the offering, a 30-day option to purchase as many as 882,352 additional shares of its stock at the IPO price, in addition to the 5.8 million offering to the public.

B. Riley Securities, Inc. and Cowen will be acting as joint book-running managers, while Tudor, Pickering, Holt & Co. are serving as lead managers.

Stronghold describes itself as an “emerging growth company” which currently operates approximately 3,000 crypto miners with a hash rate capacity of around 185 petahash per second (PH/s) according to the prospectus.

It stated that it has entered into agreements with three suppliers to provide an additional 26,150 miners with a total hash rate capacity of over 2,500 PH/s. Delivery of 72% of them has been scheduled for delivery this year, with the remainder being delivered in 2022.

Stronghold intends to acquire even more hardware with the proceeds of the IPO as an additional 55,800 miners have been planned.

The firm owns and operates the “Scrubgrass Plant” in Pennsylvania which has been recognized as an alternative energy source since it converts waste coal into energy. The prospectus stated:

“We are committed to generating our energy and managing our assets sustainably, and we believe that we are one of the first vertically integrated crypto asset mining companies with a focus on environmentally beneficial operations.”

IPO

Binance is still the top dog

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