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Coinbase’s $2.9B Deribit Deal a ‘Legitimate Threat’ for Peers, Wall Street Analysts Say

Coinbase’s (COIN) $2.9 billion acquisition of Deribit will be a tipping point for the company, pushing the U.S.-based exchange into direct competition with global heavyweights like Binance, Wall Street analysts wrote on Thursday.
The massive deal is more than just a platform expansion; it’s a paradigm shift for the exchange and trading industry. According to the analysts, the deal signals the start of a new consolidation cycle in the crypto trading industry, as smaller exchanges face pressure and TradFi firms look to expand further into the sector.
Read more: In $2.9B Deal, Coinbase Buys Deribit to Expand in U.S. Crypto Options Market
Deribit controls 85% of the global crypto options market and reported $1.2 trillion in trading volume last year. By absorbing it, Coinbase becomes the world’s largest crypto derivatives platform by open interest and options activity, KeyBanc wrote in a report.
The deal also plugs a geographic gap, expanding Coinbase’s presence overseas, where just 20% of its revenue currently originates, according to Barclay’s Benjamin Buddish.
Oppenheimer called it a “legitimate threat” to dominant exchanges, noting that Coinbase’s public status gave it the ability to fund the acquisition using stock, an option not available to most private firms. That advantage, combined with $8.5 billion in cash on hand, could turn Coinbase into the most aggressive consolidator in the space.
Options markets are attractive in part because they offer steady volumes across market cycles. Barclays estimated Deribit’s 2024 revenue between $425 million and $450 million, suggesting a healthy earnings contribution to Coinbase’s bottom line.
KeyBanc also highlighted the strategic fit, calling Deribit’s institutional user base and international footprint a natural extension of Coinbase’s futures and spot products.
Regulatory approval for the deal remains pending, but analysts expect Coinbase to provide more color during its first-quarter earnings report on Thursday.
The exchange is expected to miss Street expectations for earnings in the first quarter as markets were rattled by economic uncertainty. Shares of COIN were up 6.58% on the day, while bitcoin rose 4.31%.
Read more: Coinbase Earnings Pain Likely as Retail Activity Slumps, Wall Street Analysts Warn
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Gemini Secures MiFID II License From Malta to Offer Derivatives in EEA

Gemini, the crypto exchange founded by Cameron and Tyler Winklevoss, said it secured a MiFID II license from Malta allowing it to offer derivative products across the European Economic Area.
The license from Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) will enable the company to offer perpetual futures and other derivatives across the European Union’s 27 nations plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, once the required conditions are met, Gemini said Friday.
«There are technical and operational steps to ensure we launch these products in a compliant and secure manner, which we hope to do so in the coming months,» a Gemini spokesperson said.
Exchanges have been moving into derivatives as the next frontier for revenue growth. One of the largest crypto exchanges, Coinbase (COIN), on Thursday said it agreed to pay $2.9 billion to buy bitcoin BTC and ether ETH options platform Deribit. The purchase gives it an immediate «dominant foothold» in the derivatives space, a note from Benchmark analyst Mark Palmer said at the time.
In Europe, Gemini is following in the footsteps of rival Kraken, which secured a MiFID license in February by buying a Cyprus-based investment firm.
«This is a hugely exciting development in our 2025 European expansion, as it puts Gemini one step closer to offering our derivative products to both retail and institutional users in the EU and the EEA,» the company said.
Read more: In $2.9B Deal, Coinbase Agrees to Buy Deribit to Expand in U.S. Options Market
UPDATE (May 9, 15:26 UTC): Adds Gemini comment in third paragraph.
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Bettors Lose Millions Predicting the New Pope as Polymarket Edge Fizzles Out

Bettors on crypto prediction platform Polymarket have, in recent months, developed an enviable reputation for beating the bookies.
So it came as a surprise on Thursday when they got the outcome of the papal conclave very wrong indeed.
Winner Robert Francis Prevost wasn’t among the favorites, with bettors only giving the US-born cardinal around a 1% chance of succeeding Pope Francis ahead of the result.
Polymarket bettors, like traditional betting markets, gave Cardinal Pietro Parolin the highest odds, at 28%.
With over $28 million of bets placed on candidates other than Prevost, the result was a total wipeout for many bettors.
The event throws into question the perceived heightened accuracy of betting markets like Poymarket over conventional polls.
Polymarket lets users bet on the outcomes of everything from soccer fixtures to political elections. Unlike traditional betting platforms, where the house sets the odds based on its best diligence, Polymarket odds are a real-time reflection of the bets placed by users.
Simply put, the more demand there is for a certain outcome, the higher the odds and the prices paid for the bets are.
In November, Polymarket gained mainstream notoriety when bettors gave Republican candidate Donald Trump significantly higher odds than most other sources to win the US presidency.
“Polymarket prices seem to be wrapping up the views of smart money pretty well,” Koleman Stumpf, an economics professor at Wake Forest University in North Carolina, told CoinDesk at the time, noting that Polymarket bettors appeared to have a slight edge in predicting the election outcome.
A historical data analysis conducted by New York City-based data scientist Alex McCullough showed Polymarket previously predicted the outcome of world events one month out with 90% accuracy.
What went wrong?
The reason Polymarket bettors got the papal conclave result so wrong is that the event is extremely hard to predict, Domer, one of Polymarket’s top pseudonymous bettors, said on X.
“It’s like walking into a store that doesn’t communicate with the outside world,” he said. “Not even the participants themselves would probably know how to handicap it.”
Since it’s hard for bettors to find an edge with such an esoteric bet, many likely defaulted to following the opinions of traditional betting markets and the media, resulting in the close alignment of odds between Polymarket and other betting markets like Betfair.
The rarity of papal conclaves may also have made things difficult.
Pope Francis, the previous pope, was appointed in 2013, years before blockchain-based betting platforms like Polymarket existed. It’s also possible that many Polymarket bettors likely had no prior experience betting on the event.
Political elections, where Polymarket odds have lined up closer to results, are much more frequent and widely understood.
According to Domer, the real edge in betting on the papal conclave is not choosing the correct candidate but rather betting against those with too-high odds.
He chalked up the high odds of heavy favorites Parolin, and Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle, who Polymarket bettors gave a 20% chance of winning, to their popularity with the public and the media.
«The pricing for Parolin and Tagle were way too high, and high for not very good reasons,” he said.
Read more: Polymarket is 90% Accurate in Predicting World Events: Research
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CoinDesk 20 Performance Update: Uniswap (UNI) Surges 13.5% as Index Trades Higher

CoinDesk Indices presents its daily market update, highlighting the performance of leaders and laggards in the CoinDesk 20 Index.
The CoinDesk 20 is currently trading at 3138.72, up 6.0% (+178.07) since 4 p.m. ET on Thursday.
Nineteen of assets are trading higher.
Leaders: UNI (+13.5%) and NEAR (+11.7%).
Laggards: BCH (-0.6%) and POL (+1.1%).
The CoinDesk 20 is a broad-based index traded on multiple platforms in several regions globally.
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