Here’s What You Missed in Crypto This Week

As bitcoin, ethereum and other cryptocurrencies get increasing attention from investors, Wall Street and its traditional banks continue to adjust to the shift. Catch up on this week’s top stories highlighting the intersection of these old guard and new school areas of finance with this recap compiled by The Fly.

FIDELITY REFILES FOR BITCOIN ETF: Fidelity Investments (FNF) re-filed an application with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund called the Wise Origin Bitcoin Trust, according to a Thursday filing. The move comes after BlackRock’s (BLK) iShares unit submitted paperwork for spot bitcoin ETF, iShares Bitcoin Trust and after Fidelity had previously been rejected for a bitcoin ETF by the SEC in 2022. (MSTR) announced Wednesday that, during the period between April 29 and June 27, it acquired approximately 12,333 bitcoin for approximately $347M in cash, at an average price of approximately $28,136 per bitcoin, inclusive of fees and expenses. As of June 27, MicroStrategy, together with its subsidiaries, held an aggregate of approximately 152,333 bitcoins, which were acquired at an aggregate purchase price of approximately $4.52B and an average purchase price of approximately $29,668 per bitcoin, inclusive of fees and expenses. MicroStrategy also announced that, as of June 27, it had issued and sold an aggregate of 1,079,170 shares under the sales agreement with Cowen and Canaccord Genuity for aggregate net proceeds to MicroStrategy of approximately $333.7M. (read more)

MASTERCARD TESTS TOKENIZED BANK DEPOSITS: MasterCard (MA) is testing tokenized bank deposits through its “Multi-Token Network” in beta in the U.K., with plans to explore CBDCs and regulated stablecoins later, CoinDesk’s Ian Allison reported Wednesday. “What powers the global economy today is regulated money in the banks,” said Raj Dhamodharan, head of crypto and blockchain at MasterCard, in an interview with CoinDesk. “So we’re starting with making tokenized bank deposits, so the unit of money in a bank account is a digital asset on the blockchain, bringing the same level of programmability to those as you find with digital currency in the crypto ecosystem.” (read more)

BITNILE REPORTS HASHRATE OF 2.1 EH/S: Ault Alliance (AULT) announced Monday that its wholly owned subsidiary, BitNile has issued an unaudited update on its bitcoin mining operations. BitNile reported BNI’s mining operations are currently operating at a hashrate of 2.1 exahashes per second with approximately 9,000 of its bitcoin miners at its Michigan data center and 10,000 bitcoin miners that are being hosted through its strategic collaboration with Core Scientific (CORZ). The annualized gross value of bitcoin currently being mined utilizing BNI’s miners is more than $55M, based on current market conditions.. (read more)

RIOT PURCHASE MINERS FROM MICROBT: Riot Platforms (RIOT) announced Monday it has entered into a long-term purchase agreement with MicroBT Electronics, through its manufacturing subsidiaries. Riot has secured an initial order of 33,280 next-generation bitcoin miners from MicroBT. The miners will be produced by MicroBT in the United States for Riot’s Corsicana facility, for total consideration of $162.9M, equating to approximately $21.50 per terahash. The agreement provides delivery of the new miners starting in December, with miner deployment planned to begin in 1Q24. Upon full deployment of the miners, which is anticipated to be completed by mid-2024, Riot’s self-mining hash rate capacity is expected to increase to 20.1 EH/s. Riot has also secured the option to purchase up to 66,560 additional M56S++ miners from MicroBT, on the same terms as the initial order. Assuming full exercise of Riot’s option, the 66,560 additional miners would add 15.3 EH/s to Riot’s self-mining capacity, to a potential total of 35.4 EH/s. (read more)

CRYPTO STOCK PLAYS: Publicly traded companies in the space include Bit Digital (BTBT), Coinbase (COIN), Core Scientific, Greenidge Generation (GREE), Marathon Digital (MARA), MicroStrategy, Riot Platforms, Stronghold Digital Mining (SDIG) and TeraWulf (WULF).

PRICE ACTION: As of time of writing, bitcoin rose roughly 3% this week to $31,053 in U.S. dollars, according to CoinDesk.