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MSTR vs. BTC

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After the election, as everyone except for muggles know, the price of BTC rallied to all time highs (ATH) just short of $100,000. At the time of this writing, it’s hovering around $98,000. An interesting question then is: what happened to Michael Saylor’s MicroStrategy (MSTR) during this period?

The publicly traded stock, synonymous with its unconventional and risk-on co-founder as well as the price of BTC, also rallied to post-election ATH — as one might expect — exceeding $500.

Then last week, it took a precipitous ~22% short selling-inspired hit based off of a report expressing concerns about the company’s valuation. The noise around the stock piqued my interest. I was curious to dig in and see what potential market opportunities might exist, or at least understand the value of owning MSTR vs BTC.

This graph is a bit misleading. The main reason MSTR has outsized gains to BTC is that MSTR is highly levered. Very highly levered. It has acquired 386,700 BTC for nearly $22 billion, which represents an unsurprising ~99.5% of its balance sheet. To achieve this, the company has raised $9 billion in debt, some with zero interest. If their BTC holdings are collateralized by this debt, they could face a challenging repayment in a severe BTC downturn. They also raised $4.6 billion in equity for these BTC purchases. With an average BTC price of ~$56,500, appreciation factors heavily into the market cap.

The correlation between MSTR and BTC is relatively high, using both Pearson and Spearman correlation coefficients, at about 65% using 12 months of daily closing price data. Remove leverage and the correlation is pretty linear. Generally, follow the price of BTC and the price of MSTR will follow. The correlation is strong, but not so strong for several reasons. MSTR runs a very profitable business intelligence (BI) operation that generates annual revenues around $500 million. This makes it one of the largest players in the BI space. It’s a stock with a real business and prone to price moves based on the underlying business. BTC leverage is the key though, creating a 2.5x volatility to BTC.

Arguably, MSTR is not a good proxy for BTC and unless you’re comfortable with the increased leverage and volatility, it’s also not a comfortable investment opportunity. Just buy a BTC ETF. You can leverage BTC perpetual contracts or BTC ETFs to get a similar risk profile to MSTR. But if you want the leverage, it’s probably better to let Michael Saylor take the risk and as an investor, just own the price risk. But it isn’t a replacement.

Given the strong correlation and MSTR’s oversized exposure to BTC, is there a trade here? Let’s look at mean reversion. The dramatic MSTR rally before its big drop last week pushed the z-score to nearly four standard deviations (4σ). Looking at the graph, however, historically there haven’t been many mean reverting opportunities. A large part of this can be attributed to the recent use of leverage to add to its position, so the relationship between the two assets is now much different than before.

MSTR has the ability to sell another ~13 million in equity, which could widen the ratio further. One can conclude that MSTR is significantly overvalued to BTC and an even further narrowing of the spread could occur.

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Judge Overturns Convictions in Mango Markets Exploiter’s Crypto Fraud Case

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A U.S. judge has overturned the fraud and market manipulation convictions of Avraham Eisenberg, the crypto trader accused of draining $110 million from the now-defunct decentralized finance protocol Mango Markets.

On Friday, U.S. District Judge Arun Subramanian ruled that prosecutors failed to prove Eisenberg made false representations to the platform.

He also moved to acquit Eisenberg of wire fraud charges. The investor manipulated the price of Mango’s native token MNGO with massive trades by more than 1,000% in 20 minutes before getting the protocol to allow him to borrow and withdraw $110 million in various cryptocurrencies, backed by the inflated collateral.

Eisenberg’s defense argued that the platform, which operated through smart contracts, allowed anyone to transact freely and that he simply exploited a vulnerability. The judge agreed, stating that Mango’s permissionless structure meant that there “was insufficient evidence of falsity” from prosecutors regarding Eisenberg’s representation to Mango Markets.

Eisenberg was arrested in December 2022, and while this case collapsed, he is still currently serving a four-year sentence handed out after he pleaded guilty to the possession of child sexual abuse material.

“From the beginning, we said this case was fatally flawed,” his attorney Brian Klein of Waymaker LLP said. “We are very pleased for Avi that the judge granted our motion and dismissed the case.”

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Swiss watchmaker Franck Muller Unveils Limited Edition Solana Watch

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If you’ve ever wanted to have your Solana wallet on your wrist while flexing your wealth, Swiss watchmaker Franck Muller is making that a reality.

The watch market is stepping into the Web3 ecosystem with a Solana-inspired, limited-edition series of watches that contain an embedded unique QR code to directly link to the user’s Solana address.

The company’s Solana-inspired watch collection is limited to 1,111 units that will set buyers back 20,000 Swiss francs (around $24,300).

While the watches feature a unique design that could appeal to Solana ecosystem participants, their launch comes at a time when, unfortunately, flaunting crypto-related wealth is becoming risky.

The cryptocurrency industry has seen dozens of physical attacks just this year, with a notable case seeing the daughter and grandson of Pierre Noizat, CEO of crypto platform Paymium, being targeted in a daytime attempted kidnapping. The attack was filmed and shared on social media.

While that kidnapping attempt failed, an earlier one in the same city saw the father of a crypto millionaire get abducted. Police managed to rescue the man, but not before his finger was severed.

Earlier this year, the co-founder of hardware wallet maker Ledger, David Balland, along with his wife, was abducted from his home and saw similar treatment. The couple was later rescued by authorities, and a ransom that had been paid out was seized.

There have been many other similar attacks in recent months.

Franck Muller is pitching the collection as a «phygital» (physical-digital) symbol of identity and ownership in the crypto age. While the watch is certainly a piece of crypto mythos, it may be a collectible that investors may not want to show off.

Read more: ‘Major Wake-Up Call’: How $400M Coinbase Breach Exposes Crypto’s Dark Side

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A Small Food Firm Buys 21 bitcoin, Jumping on BTC Treasury Trend, Shares Fall Anyways

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DDC Enterprise (DDC), an Asian food company, has announced the acquisition of 21 BTC as part of a long-term plan to incorporate the cryptocurrency into its corporate treasury.

The company, led by founder and CEO Norma Chu, exchanged 254,333 class A ordinary shares for BTC, in a transaction valued at roughly $2.28 million, according to a press release.

The move positions DDC among a growing cohort of public companies using BTC as a treasury asset. Two more purchases totaling 79 BTC are expected in the coming days, bringing the company’s initial holdings to 100 BTC.

In a shareholder letter issued last week, Chu outlined plans to accumulate up to 500 BTC within six months and aim for 5,000 BTC in three years.

While companies adopting bitcoin as a strategic treasury asset often see major price rises, DDC saw the opposite. The company’s shares dropped more than 12% on Friday’s trading session, while the S&P 500 dropped 0.6% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 1%.

DigiAsia (FAAS), for example, saw its share prices surge more than 90% in a single trading session after announcing a $100 million BTC treasury plan earlier this month.

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