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Coinbase Listing
Bitcoin extended its rally on Wednesday, reaching a new record price of more than $64,000 even as Coinbase listed its shares on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange trading under the ticker COIN.
Coinbase’s direct listing was priced at $250; the stock opened at $381 and closed at $328.28 Wednesday. Coinbase continued to rise, surging to a high of $429.26 and reaching the market capitalization of around $100.5 billion.
The listing of the cryptocurrency exchange platform was conducted succesfully amid a growing acceptance of Bitcoin.
Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Wednesday described crypto assets in an interview as “mere vehicles for speculation”, since the public isn’t using them for payments, such as the USD currency, but rather for speculation.
“It’s a little bit like gold, where for thousands of years human beings have given gold this special value that it doesn’t have from an industrial standpoint, but nonetheless for thousands of years they’ve done it. So bitcoin is much more like that. Cryptocurrencies are not being actively used for payments,” Powell said.
Vaccine Roll Out
Johnson & Johnson on Tuesday postponed the rollout of its COVID-19 vaccine in Europe over concerns related to the development of blood clots among rare recipients.
According to the United States Food and Drug Administration, six people, out of seven million that received the J&J jab, developed blood clots. The US administration said the halt in rolling out Johnson and Johnson’s (J&J) vaccine against coronavirus would not significantly affect the United States’ mass vaccination program.
Grab Listing
Singaporean ride-hailing company Grab has announced it will go public in the United States via a special-purpose acquisition company (SPAC) merger with Altimeter Growth Corp (AGC).
According to Bloomberg, the deal would make the ride-hailing and food-delivery giant the first Southeast Asian tech unicorn to go public through a SPAC and give it funds to expand.
The ride-hailing company noted it plans to list on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the ticker symbol GRAB. Under the deal with AGC, Grab will get $4.5 billion in cash, including $4 billion in private investment in public equity (PIPE) funding.
ByteDance IPO
ByteDance Ltd. has reportedly submitted documents for its potential initial public offering (IPO) on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, according to the China Securities Journal.
ByteDance Ltd, which owns video apps TikTok and Douyin has appointed former Xiaomi International Business President Zhou Shouzi as its new chief financial officer as part of the preparation for an IPO.
The South China Morning Post reported that Bytedance told its employees that they can now opt for either receiving bonuses or the company’s untraded stocks at $126 per share this year, up from $50 per share offer in 2020.
Private equity investors value the company at nearly $400 billion.
Oil
The Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) revealed on Tuesday that it expects the global oil demand to jump by 6 million barrels per day (bpd) in 2021, revising its previous projection upward by approximately 100,000 bpd.
The cartel estimated that the demand will average about 96.5 million bpd in the entire 2021.
The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) said in its monthly report released on Tuesday that it expects the global economy to grow by 5.4% in 2021.
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