Ark Invest CEO Cathie Wood spoke on Monday about Coinbase shares. He confirmed that the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) labeling nine altcoin projects traded on Coinbase as unregistered securities caused the firm to sell some of its holdings on the cryptocurrency exchange. Here are the details…
Ark Invest sells shares of Bitcoin and altcoin exchange Coinbase
The CEO said that the SEC’s claim, which came just days ago, has triggered a degree of regulatory “uncertainty” for the crypto industry, according to Bloomberg. On July 26, Ark Investment sold over 1.4 million shares in Coinbase worth $75 million. According to the fund’s website, Wood’s company still owns over $451 million of stake in Coinbase. As we reported on Kriptokoin.com, Ark Investment has been buying shares of Coinbase since it was launched on the Nasdaq in April 2021. As of the end of June, Ark Invest held 8.95 million shares, according to Bloomberg. Namely, he was the third largest shareholder of Coinbase.
There are nine altcoins that the SEC has accused Coinbase of “selling unregistered securities.” These consist of AMP, DDX, DFX, CHROME, LCX, RGT, RLY, POWR and XYO. Wood said he made the move because it seemed like a positive alternative amid the drop in share prices in Shopify and confusion about how Coinbase would deal with regulators. Wood asked the financial news service how many coins Coinbase would have to issue if the company decided not to record them. He also said he questions how the company’s business model might be affected if he does.
“Insider trading” accusations did not affect the company’s decision
He also pointed to accusations against individuals for allegedly running the SEC’s insider trading scheme. He also explained that these did not affect Ark Investment’s decision to sell its stake in Coinbase. One of the people accused in the case is a former Coinbase product manager with prior knowledge of the tokens that will be newly listed on the exchange. Since the firm announced that it has sold some of its shares in Coinbase, the stock price of the exchange has risen 84 percent. So, it rose to $97.67. However, Coinbase was at $52.93 on July 26.
The stock recently soared on news that Coinbase has signed a deal with asset manager Blackrock. The exchange announced that Blackrock is providing crypto trading technology to institutional investors on its Aladdin platform. While Coinbase has seen strong gains in stock price recently, the company’s shares were trading at around $251 per share on Wall Street last year. But it has dropped 61 percent since the start of this year.
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