🐳 Daily Edition: Trump Wallet Mishap and Circle's $7B IPO

In case you missed it, yesterday’s drama involved Magic Eden announcing the launch of a crypto wallet in partnership with the Trump team… which members of the Trump family including Eric, Don Jr. and Barron were quick to come out and denounce as fake news. The story here is still brewing, but it seems at the very least members of the Trump memecoin team were involved in the deal. The outrage from the family is likely due to their plans to launch their own crypto wallet down the line, and the organization has spread so much that now deals with their names on them are being done without their express permission. It’s certainly an interesting time in the market.

In more exciting news, tomorrow Circle’s stock will officially be live for trading on the Nasdaq. For anyone who doesn’t know, Circle is the company behind stablecoin giant USDC, which has attained a total issuance of over $60B and is the second largest stablecoin behind USDT (Tether). The stock is set to start trading at a price of $31, giving Circle an implied market cap of just under $7B. Demand is expected to be quite strong given reports that the IPO was 25x oversubscribed, which is interesting given how little demand it seems to have from crypto natives. While you’ll see traders on Twitter discussing how bad Circle’s economics are (mostly due to their existing agreement for revenue sharing with Coinbase), it seems TradFi is more looking at this as a vehicle for stablecoin exposure. Whichever way the stock trades tomorrow, it will certainly be volatile, so if you’re looking to buy in it’s probably a good idea to wait a few days and see where things settle out.

We also finally have confirmation of a pump.fun token, set to launch in 2 weeks. The terms we now so far is the team intends to sell 25% of the supply at a $4B valuation, aiming for a $1B raise. With their new focus on livestreaming, a warchest of that size could potentially allow them to start competing (at least on a marketing level) with the likes of Twitch and Kick. There’s not much info on the token itself yet, though rumors indicate there will be some amount of value accrual to the token based on platform revenue. We also still have no confirmation on whether there will be an airdrop or not, but my spidey senses tell me there will be.

If everyone hates you, you might just be right.

The Beluga intern has been hard at work gathering all the most important crypto news stories so you have them in one place!

The Majors

• JPMorgan to accept Bitcoin ETFs as loan collateral in expansion of crypto access: Bloomberg

• Ethereum Foundation expects 2025-26 to be ‘pivotal’ for the ecosystem as it reforms its treasury management

Alt Coins and Stocks

• Stablecoin giant Circle raises $1.1B in IPO, valued at $6.9B ahead of NYSE debut

• Solana slips as pump.fun token rumors swirl

Regulatory

• ‘Unclaimed’ Bitcoin in California could be seized — but there’s a catch

• Police nab alleged mastermind behind French crypto kidnappings

Random

• Nasdaq-listed K-pop media firm K Wave stock rallies 130% after announcing Bitcoin acquisition strategy

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