載舟覆舟！Crypto、PayPal走勢大相逕庭 比特幣是罪魁禍首

載舟覆舟！Crypto、PayPal走勢大相逕庭 比特幣是罪魁禍首

PayPal (PYPL-US) 和 Square (SQ-US) 都靠比特幣吸引顧客使用其 app 並維持其參與度，但兩家股價走勢卻大相逕庭，自從比特幣一個月前開始下跌以來，Square 股價就表現不佳。

如果加密貨幣持續熊市，兩家股價可能都會苦不堪言，但 Square 可能會面臨更多壓力，部分原因是該公司在散戶投資者中與比特幣的聯繫更為緊密。

兩種支付 app 都可輕鬆買賣和儲值加密貨幣，PayPal 在其 app 上提供數種加密貨幣，而 Square 只供應比特幣。這兩家作法像經紀人，賺取的是每筆交易的手續費和利潤。

來自加密貨幣的營收淨額並非其整體業務的大部分。MoffettNathanson 分析師 Lisa Ellis 指出，PayPal 今年營收約只因加密貨幣交易增加 2%，在營收總額 260 億美元中僅占 3 億至 6 億美元。

Square 第一季營收總額 51 億美元，其中比特幣營收 35 億美元。Square 的會計方式是：扣除購買比特幣的成本，在當季 9.64 億美元毛利總額中，只計入這些交易 7500 萬美元的毛利。

雖然加密貨幣的獲利非常微薄，但這兩家支付公司都將加密貨幣交易視為攏絡顧客並提高 app 參與度的一種手段。

Ellis 指出，「他們的加密貨幣用戶一天會多次打開 app 確認價格，這就讓公司有機會出售其他服務。」

Square 與加密貨幣聯繫更緊密，但部分原因是其創辦人兼執行長 Jack Dorsey 是加密貨幣狂粉，近日也曾在推特上表示，「比特幣使一切變得更好。」Square 過去幾季資產負債表上認列投資比特幣 2.2 億美元，現已對該投資進行減值。

加密貨幣低迷顯然對 Square 的影響更大。在過去的一個月中，Square 股價下跌約 17%，而 PayPal 股價僅下跌 4%。

但加密貨幣並非 Square 唯一苦痛來源，投資者逃離高倍數成長股的浪潮也重創 Square，反映投資者在價格上反映預期上升的通膨，這點會降低未來收益的現值。

根據未來 12 個月的估算，Square 現行股價是企業價值倍數 (EV/Ebitda) 的 113 倍，PayPal 則為 43 倍，對比其他同業如 Visa (V-US) 和 Mastercard (MA-US) 僅 27 倍至 30 倍。

Ellis 談到 PayPal 和 Square 時說，「他們是我兩家長期最愛的支付公司，但實際考慮上來說，機構投資者如果擔憂長期通膨，就會對這些高倍數股覺得反感。」

隨著比特幣價格的飆升，投資者也迷戀上這些股票，但水能載舟也會覆舟，如今比特幣和其他加密貨幣恐怕也是令他們憂心忡忡的原因之一。

週一美股普遍上漲，PayPal 週一上漲 2.58%，收 257.17 美元；Square 上漲 5.47%，收 210.95 美元。

Crypto wrap: WazirX soars after India unbans token; Mina hits ATH on exchange listings

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A utility token issued by India’s leading cryptocurrency exchange has soared after the country’s cryptocurrency community won a battle for acceptance with the banking system.

At 11.22am AEST, WazirX‘s WRX token was up more than 50 per cent to US$1.96, recovering almost fully from the March 19 crash. Earlier this morning it was trading as high as US$2.26.

The No. 96 crypto, WRX is a utility coin used to pay for fees on the Mumbai-based, Binance-owned WazirX exchange.

The gains came after the Reserve Bank of India advised India’s banks that they couldn’t rely on an order that the central bank issued in April 2018 banning cryptocurrency sales.

That order was struck down by the country’s Supreme Court in March 2020, but some banks were still reportedly citing it in emails to customers deplatforming them for buying crypto.

#IndiaWantsCrypto was the second-place trending item on Twitter in India after RBI’s advisory.

Great to see such clear directions from the RBI. A Great win for Crypto Family in India. Lets Rock!!!! #IndiaWantsCrypto pic.twitter.com/XjKAqqdcIW — Vicky Kudi (@KudiVicky) May 31, 2021

WazirX chief executive Nischal Shetty had been asking the RBI to intervene, saying that banking issues were hurting an industry that employs over 1,000 Indians in more than 350 startups.

“India cannot sit on the sidelines and miss this innovation. We cannot lose our software edge as a nation,” he tweeted last week.

Mina Protocol at all-time high on new listings

Mina Protocol (MINA) was the second-best top 100 gainer this morning, and also the second top 100 coin to hit an all-time high since the May 19 crash. Helium (HNT) did so over the weekend.

Mina was trading at US$8.97 at noon AEST after being newly listed on OKEx and Kraken.

The No. 79 crypto, Mina uses a cryptographic tool known as zk-SNARKS to compress the size of its blockchain to just 22kb, compared to hundreds of gigabytes on Bitcoin and Ethereum. That means that connecting to the Mina network is much quicker.

While legacy #blockchains are 300GB+, Mina stays light at ~22kb — the size of a couple of tweets. This lets Mina stay accessible to anyone. Watch this #MinaSnapshot to learn more and don’t forget to subscribe. There are more videos coming your way soon!https://t.co/tnDF8Y7nWi — Mina Protocol (@MinaProtocol) May 17, 2021

The San Fransisco-based project was once known as the Coda Protocol but rebranded in September after a trademark lawsuit.

BTC hits four-day high; nearly everything gains

Meanwhile, Bitcoin had pulled back slightly after hitting a four-day high of US$37,836 at 10:40am AEST.

But BTC was still up 6.5 per cent to US$37,929 ($47,500) at 12.20AEST.

Ethereum was changing hands at US$2,628 ($3,394), up 14.5 per cent from 24 hours ago.

More than three dozen of the top 100 coins were up more than 10 per cent, with Theta Fuel, Aave and Kusama (and the aforementioned WazirX and Mina) up by more than 20 per cent.

Of the top 100 tokens, only stablecoins were in the red. (Such tokens are inversely correlated to the market, often trading for slightly less than their US$1 peg when most coins are gaining).

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Despite crypto crackdown in China, traders still betting

Chinese investors are paying little heed to the government’s biggest crackdown on cryptocurrency trading since 2017, underscoring the challenge for Beijing as it tries to rein in a speculative boom in digital assets.

Knee-jerk selling has given way to a steady recovery on over-the-counter platforms that Chinese crypto traders have used since domestic exchanges were banned in 2017. One key gauge of local sentiment — the exchange rate between China’s yuan and the stablecoin Tether — fell as much as 4.4% after the government’s warning earlier this month but has since recouped more than half the loss, according to crypto data platform Feixiaohao, a Chinese equivalent of CoinMarketCap.

China escalated its crackdown after a frenzied surge in Bitcoin and other tokens over the past six months heightened longstanding Communist Party concerns about the potential for fraud, money laundering and trading losses by individual investors. Yet the hard-to-trace nature of transactions on local OTC platforms and peer-to-peer networks means it will be extremely difficult for authorities to enforce a wholesale ban.

That may come as a relief to global crypto enthusiasts after worries about a plunge in Chinese buying power contributed to the nearly $1 trillion selloff in digital assets from record highs in mid-May.

As to the losses and the crackdown, “I don’t care,” said Charles, a 35-year-old real estate consultant in Shanghai who asked to be identified only by his English first name. He’s been buying cryptocurrencies since 2017 and claims to have lost $11 million over three days in the recent pullback. “To me it’s giving back the profits I made in the past few months,” he said. “I’m looking at the 10- to 20-year horizon.”

Before China outlawed crypto exchanges in 2017, local investors owned an estimated 7% of the world’s Bitcoin and accounted for about 80% of trading, according to state media. The exchange ban has made it impossible to gauge those figures today, but Chinese investors are still widely believed to have a major presence in the crypto world via domestic OTC platforms and offshore venues that they access using virtual private networks.

Domestic trades involving yuan and digital coins are difficult for China’s government to track because they typically take place in two separate steps.

The first happens on OTC platforms operated by firms including Huobi and OKEx, which allow traders to post bids and offers. Once both sides agree on a price, the buyer will use a separate payments platform — operated by their bank or a fintech company like Ant Group Co. — to send yuan to the seller. The digital coins, usually held in escrow by the OTC platform until the yuan payment clears, are then transferred to the buyer. Chinese regulators often have no way to connect one step of the transaction to the other.

Because the yuan leg of the trades take place entirely within China’s domestic financial system, the risk of large-scale capital outflows is low. But that hasn’t stopped the government from warning financial firms and individual investors to stay away from crypto.

Regulators this month reminded Chinese banks and payments firms of the requirement to identify and block suspicious transactions, and pointed out that facilitating cryptocurrency trades often violates banking rules. China’s State Council called for a clamp down on Bitcoin trading and mining, vowing to “resolutely” prevent financial risks.

Policy makers may be keen to avoid any major market disruptions around the politically sensitive 100th anniversary of the ruling Communist Party on July 1.

After the government’s statement, Huobi said it stopped its miner hosting services in mainland China and is scaling back futures contracts and leveraged investment products in some markets. It’s unclear whether the firm plans to shut its OTC platform.

Chinese regulators have so far stopped short of labeling individual trading illegal, but the crackdown will involve the public security department as some of the activities were suspected to have facilitated money laundering and terror financing, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Police in Beijing have distributed printed warnings about potential risks associated with cryptocurrencies. Virtual currencies are among popular means for latest scams, and anyone “in a panic, having a hard time distinguishing or not sure what to do” should call the local police contact listed, according to one notice seen by Bloomberg.

On social media, some crypto investors have made unverified claims that they were summoned by local police recently and warned against the risk of investing in cryptocurrencies. One investor said local authorities required him to sell his holdings. Another said police asked him to delete the trading app from his phone.

Chinese officials see their success cleaning up the peer-to-peer lending industry two years ago as a model for its cryptocurrency crackdown, said the person familiar, asking not to be identified as the matter is private. The country purged the P2P industry after frauds and defaults became rampant, in some cases leading to suicide and street protests. In its heyday the sector had more than 50 million users and $150 billion in outstanding loans.

The extreme price swings of cryptocurrencies have already left a mark. In one high-profile case, a Chinese man from the eastern city of Dalian killed his three-year-old daughter and tried to commit suicide with his wife after losing 20 million yuan ($3.1 million) on a leveraged bet on Bitcoin last June, according to local media reports.

Peter, a Beijing tech worker, piled 20,000 yuan into cryptocurrencies three weeks ago, just in time for latest round of volatility. Within days, his portfolio grew to nearly 100,000 yuan, then quickly fell back down to 14,000 yuan. He echoed the carpe diem philosophy of crypto traders globally: “It doesn’t matter if it all goes to zero. But what if it brings me sudden wealth one day?”