Coinbase, one of the world’s most popular and earliest cryptocurrency exchanges, made its debut on the public market on Wednesday, hitting the growing interest of investors in digital currencies.
The expected expected direct listing of Coinbase led the shares to close at $ 328.28 on Wednesday, giving PitchBook a valuation of $ 85.7 billion – about ten times what it last valued as a private company. is.
This is 31.3% higher than Coinbase’s reference price of $ 250. But because he opted for a direct listing, no shares traded at that price, but at a price of $ 381.
As the valuation of Coinbase skyrocketed, its top executives and largest investors became significantly richer.
The interest of CEO and co-founder Brian Armstrong – 2.75 million Class A shares and 36.9 million Class B shares – is now worth $ 13 billion.
Two Coinbase executives, chief product officer Surojit Chatterjee and legal officer Paul Grewal, who both joined the company less than 15 months ago, total $ 957 million.
At Wednesday’s closing price, Chatterjee’s 2 million Class A shares are worth $ 657.2 million, while Grewal’s 915,331 Class A shares are worth $ 300 million.
Chatterjee joined Coinbase in January 2020 after spending 11 years with Google. Grewal just joined last summer and left his four-year term as vice president and deputy chief executive at Facebook.