The longtime crypto-bull Meltem Demirors said on Tuesday that the rise of bitcoin has built up wealth for a different kind of investor.
The commentary on CNBC’s “Squawk Box” comes one day before an important milestone for the crypto world would take place: Coinbase’s Nasdaq debut.
“This is good for me: Bitcoin has created a lot of wealth for people who were not part of the traditional financial system, but also were not money managers,” said Demirors, chief strategy officer at CoinShares, an investment in digital assets. said. firm.
She said she entered bitcoin when it was about $ 150 per coin. It hit another record high on Tuesday, trading above $ 63,000 as investors await Coinbase’s direct listing.
Demirors said the digital currency’s public debut on Wednesday would hit hundreds, if not thousands, of multimillionaires and billionaires who all love crypto and are likely to take some of their listing returns and continue to invest in the crypto ecosystem.
“There really is this nice recursive effect where this industry is not just about the assets. It’s actually about the companies in which we have been investing for almost a decade,” she added.
Indeed, Soona Amhaz, a general partner of the crypto-venture Volt Capital, said the direct listing of Coinbase is far from the only exciting development for digital assets.
“The crypto story does not end with the fact that Coinbase is known,” she said on CNBC’s “Closing Bell”. “This is a major interest in the ground for the development of crypto-enterprises.”
Some believe Coinbase could reach a valuation of up to $ 100 billion. Although such a market capitalization would be monumental for the crypto industry, Amhaz said what is more important is continuing to expand the number of people who own digital assets around the world.
“We are going to see more crypto businesses building to help set up the next 100 million users in crypto and be exposed to this new financial paradigm,” she said.
Bitcoin was created in 2009 and is the largest cryptocurrency in the world by market value. Its price has risen particularly high in recent months. Already in October, bitcoin traded less than $ 11,000 per currency.
One important factor that fueled the increase was further institutional adoption. Some companies, such as Tesla, have bought bitcoin with cash on its balance sheet.
Last month, Morgan Stanley was the first major U.S. bank to announce that it would provide access to bitcoin funds for its wealth management clients. Another Wall Street titan, Goldman Sachs, is also expected to take similar steps for clients of his private wealth management group.