Coinbase debuted on NASDAQ on Wednesday under the ticker COIN in what was widely regarded as a watershed moment for Crypto Market. While it was a historic step, some believe that the reaction to the direct listing was underwhelming. Among these is the American financier Anthony Scaramucci, who was surprised by the lack of interest from commercial banks.
Scaramucci likened Coinbase listing to the Netscape IPO in the 90s, which prompted Bill Gates to invest millions of dollars into Internet Explorer. Scaramucci believes that major banks should have adopted the same strategy and worked on a clone of the crypto exchange.
Galaxy Digital’s CEO Mike Novogratz shared similar thoughts saying that even Google and Facebook traded in a lackluster manner after their IPOs but then reached astronomical heights. Novogratz also revealed that he has shares in Coinbase.
Coinbase set a base price of $250 for its shares, but since it is a direct listing, the shares were never traded at that price. The first day of trading was quite volatile as shares reached the $430 mark before dropping as low as $310. This was followed by a minor recovery, and trading was closed at $328.28
Coinbase didn’t follow the traditional IPO process, allowing stakeholders to start trading immediately at a base price. At the time of close, the company had a total market cap of $85.8 billion. The market cap comes down to $62 million if we exclude options and restricted stock.
