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SEC PROTECTED INVESTORS FROM 12-THOUSAND PERCENT GAINS. Yes, the headline is sarcasm.
The SEC’s rejection late last week of a “Spot Bitcoin” ETF was hardly the first time the federal agency acted to bar non crypto tech savvy investors from gaining exposure to bitcoin.
A spot bitcoin ETF was actually first proposed in 2013. If investors had been allowed to put money into such a financial vehicle at that time, and left their money in the fund until the present moment, they would have experienced 12-thousand percent gains.
As a painful game, contemplate this math: a 1,000 thousand dollar investment would have turned into 1,200,000 million.
Feeling protected and grateful to the SEC yet?
Van Eck, the firm whose proposed ETF was rejected, commented on the matter:
“We are disappointed in today’s update from the SEC declining approval of our physical bitcoin ETF. We believe that investors should be able to gain BTC exposure through a regulated fund and that a non-futures ETF structure is the superior approach.”
Matias Dorta, an asset manager at Roundhill Investments, was one of those who pointed out the huge gains that investors had lost out on so far as a result of the SEC’s actions.
“The SEC first rejected a $BTC ETF in 2013. They successfully protected investors from +12,700% gains.”
Few were really shocked that the Feds are still standing in the way of everyday investors—the kind of people working and doing things like put money into sometimes bizarrely intricate college savings funds and medical sayings accounts.
Still, experienced crypto holders aren’t thrilled, to say the least, with this most recent effort to throw some cold water on the latest crypto sector surge. They’re all over YouTube and Twitter, pointing out that a spot ETF approval likely would’ve meant a decisive launching point for an “altcoin season” between now and Christmas.
“Altcoin Season” refers to a historical tendency of smaller crypto coins associated with blockchain projects to actually outperform gains in bitcoin during some past crypto market boom cycles. It happened in 2017. And 2015.
Many of those same crypto holders and proselytizers are still forecasting an upbeat holiday season. One reason? Family and friends around the table at Thanksgiving will likely be talking about cryptos, and which coins and strategies they favor, etc.
People may disagree on politics, but everyone wants to make money.
VENTURE CAPITAL GETTING A DAO MAKEOVER. Venture fund management and venture funds themselves may have to adjust and try to leverage some of the democratizing efficiencies and advantages of blockchain based DAOs (Decentralized Autonomous Organizations).
DAOs, which are compilations of smart contract codes, are already being used to create funding for different financial ventures and even social causes.
The code, once designed and activated on a blockchain, can take care of the investment and reward mechanisms.
A recent Cointelegraph.com article noted that venture capitalists will have to adapt the way they invest in businesses, interact with them, and provide value.
A prime example involves the use of public sales, such as initial coin offerings, initial decentralized exchange offerings, and initial exchange offerings.
DAOs can enable a larger number of investors to participate in a round with fewer entry barriers and lower coordination costs. Many Web 3.0 enterprises are also led by a community-run DAO, with investment choices verified by a community vote.
Notably, funding for the decentralized SushiSwap exchange was accomplished via a community DAO.
In contrast, conventional investment agreements are often negotiated behind closed doors with little to no stakeholder participation.
There are other venture capital oriented DAOs making waves. BitDAO, one of the biggest, is focused on funding promising DeFi and other initiatives.
PleasrDAO is an investment and art purchase platform that gathers digital NFT art. It’s seeking to change the way people invest in art by innovating in the areas of digital art and ownership.
COINBASE MAY SOON FEATURE DEFI OPTIONS. The only crypto exchange currently listed with Nasdaq in the U.S., Coinbase, may soon be offering DeFi options for its user base.
Speaking at a fintech event hosted by Citi this past Monday, Coinbase CFO Alesia Haas laid out a DeFi path:
“We plan eventually to service third-party apps inside our main product and so that we’re going to be agnostic between a customer choosing a Coinbase product or a third-party DeFi product. We want to introduce and find the best product for our customers.”
According to news outlet theblockcrypto.com, Haas said that Coinbase’s relatively mainstream crypto users and DeFi protocols usually naivagated by more experienced crypto holders would both gain by the company’s strategy.
Haas said Coinbase could act as a bridge, making DeFi more user friendly for its users:
“So how do we think about Coinbase in relative to DeFi? So earlier, I talked about our…crypto as an app platform strategy, and this is where this all comes in. As crypto as an app platform, will help DeFi in two ways. One, we’re building tools to accelerate the builders in the ecosystem through Coinbase Cloud. And we believe this opportunity itself will be large in the future because more and more companies are going to want to offer crypto services to their end customers. So the second thing we do is that we’re helping with distribution. Just like we’ve been a bridge to crypto buy, sell, we’ll be a bridge to DeFi.”