By
Steve Muchoki
April 4th, 2024
Mike Novogratz hopes to make the Galaxy Digital merchant bank as the “Goldman Sachs of crypto”.
Billionaire investors and Bitcoin Bull Mike Novogratz is back in the news once again as the hedge fund manager has successfully managed to raise $250 million for a cryptocurrency merchant bank named Galaxy Digital. Back in September 2017, Mike Novogratz first unveiled his plan of launching the crypto asset fund with a proposed $500 million valuation back then.
Last month, Novogratz further unveiled the plans of listing the shares of Galaxy Digital LP on Canada’s TSX Venture Exchange. Sighting a person familiar with the matter, Bloomberg in its latest report has stated that Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital has managed to raise this huge figure amidst the ongoing meltdown in the crypto markets and more specifically Bitcoin slipping from $20000 levels to as low as $6000 in just over past two months.
As per the public statements made by the firm earlier, Mike Novogratz hopes to make the Galaxy Digital merchant bank as the “Goldman Sachs of crypto” which will supposedly have a fourfold business model in place. As the fundraising round was accomplished through private placements, the complete list of investors was not made public.
However, the source familiar with the matter said that Terry Gou, the billionaire chief executive officer of China’s Foxconn, is one of the popular names in the list. The source has further claimed that investors will have to buy the shares of Galaxy Digital LP via a holding company that will trade on Toronto’s TSX Venture Exchange.
In addition to trading cryptos, the merchant bank will also make principal investments in cryptos, manage assets for its clients and also provide the necessary advice on blockchain related ventures. Having received a huge capital funding, the company plans to buy Canadian startup First Coin Capital and then further merge it with Bradmer Pharmaceuticals that will be publicly listed on Toronto’s TSX Venture Exchange (TSX-V) via a reverse takeover. Once the merger is done, BRadmer will be renamed to Galaxy Digital which will allow the firm to trade publicly without the need to undergo the process of traditional financial disclosure associated with the listing.
A merchant bank is one of the most ambitious concepts to emerge as a result of fuss at the cryptocurrency market. The management team at Galaxy will include Richard Tavoso, the former head of global arbitrage at RBC Capital Markets; Christopher Ferraro, formerly with HPS Investment Partners and BlackRock Kelso Capital Advisors; and David Namdar, who previously worked for Millennium Partners and UBS AG. Novogratz will be chairman and chief executive officer.
Mike Novogratz has been optimistic about the future of cryptocurrencies and its underlying technology which empowers users to make global transactions just in an instant at much-reduced costs over the existing banking infrastructure. When Bitcoin was in a huge bull run last year, Novogratz also stated that the cryptocurrency can touch $40000 by the end of 2018.