Coinbase, the San Francisco-based crypto exchange went public on Wednesday, becoming the first major crypto currency company to make its stock market debut.
Coinbase has been listed on the Nasdaq stock exchange using “COIN” as its ticker symbol. The crypto exchange has smashed on to Wall Street with a bang, in what is yet another leap for the validation of digital currencies.
The Strongest Stock Market Debut Since Facebook
The crypto exchange began the day trading at $381 a share, rising at one point to $429 during its first day. As a result, this pushed the company’s total valuation somewhere in the region of $100 billion at one stage.
For a frame of reference, that’s roughly the same valuation that Facebook had when it first went public back in 2012. That’s not the only similarity that the two companies’ respective stock market debuts share.
“Crypto is the Future of Finance”
Facebook’s 2012 public offering was then heralded as being a landmark moment for the validation of social media. Fast forward almost a decade (or swap the numbers 1 and 2 around) and Coinbase’s stock market debut has been lauded as a landmark moment for cryptocurrencies. Investor Ian Lee has described cryptocurrencies as being “the future of finance” and pointed to Coinbase’s stunning debut helping to further assert that claim.
Coinbase – Building the “Cryptoeconomy”
Part of Coinbase’s mission is to disrupt the financial system as we know it, building the “cryptoeconomy” in doing so. In a filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission back in December 2020, Coinbase claimed the idea behind the so-called Cryptoeconomany was to build “a more fair, accessible, efficient, and transparent financial system for the internet age.”
At the time of the filing, Coinbase told its regulators that it then had 43million users and 7,000 retail institutions all active on the platform. There are no figures for the current active user figures, but we can be certain that it has only grown so far in 2021.
A Further Sign That Banks Are Embracing Crypto
There’s been no secret made of the fact that the banking and finance world has gradually warmed to the idea of crypto over the past year. However Coinbase going public is the biggest step yet, with the soaring value emphasizing that even further.
While there are still doubts and concerns over the volatility of cryptocurrencies, many leading finance figures have recently changed their tune. Included in those who have recently changed their tune on cryptocurrencies is former White House Director of Communications and financier Anthony Scaramucci. Speaking to CNBC in December last year, Scaramucci backed bitcoin’s value to surge beyond $100,000 before the end of 2021.
Bitcoin Doubles on 2020 End Price
Coinbase’s monumental public debut has coincided with yet another bitcoin spike in value. Bitcoin has been reaching new record highs on almost a weekly basis in 2020. The world’s leading cryptocoin this week reached highs of over $68,800 – over double its 2020 year end value of around $28,000.
