By
Steve Muchoki
April 25th, 2024
Bullish will merge with ex-NYSE exec’s SPAC – Far Peak. The merged company will have a pro forma equity value of $9 billion, equal to the value of $10 per share.
The Bullish crypto exchange has today announced plans to go public via a SPAC merger with Far Peak Acquisition Corp. CI A (NYSE: FPAC). The agreement will be finalized by the end of this year and will see Bullish publicly listed on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE).
Far Peak SPAC firm is under the leadership of Thomas W. Farley. Co-directing is David Bonanno, former hedge fund managing director at Third Point LLC. Initially, Farley held executive positions at the NYSE Group and has 15 years’ worth of exchange leadership. Following completion of the deal, he will assume the position of CEO of Bullish, as agreed upon in May.
Brendan Blumer, the CEO of Block. one software firm (of which Bullish is a subsidiary), will be appointed Chairman of Bullish.
The merged company will have a pro forma equity value of $9 billion, equal to the value of $10 per share. The stock value will also be determined by the worth of crypto assets at the time of closing the transaction.
Bullish SPAC Merger
Launched in May this year, Bullish is underpinned by a cluster of noteworthy deal-makers. These include Peter Thiel of Thiel Capital and Founders Fund, and also PayPal’s co-founder. Also on the list are hedge fund managers Alan Howard and Louis Bacon, and the digital asset manager Galaxy Digital. With this support, Bullish received an initial capital injection of over $10 billion in cash alongside digital assets worth 164,000 Bitcoin.
Last month, there were talks of the Bullish SPAC merger. Sources suggested it could value the exchange platform at $12 billion.
In the weeks leading up to the public launch, Bullish intends to run a private pilot program. Through the program, participants will gain first-hand experience of the platform within a simulated market environment. The test will also include some innovative aspects of the Bullish crypto exchange. These are Bullish Hybrid Order Book and Liquidity Pools.
SPAC mergers have continued to gain popularity among crypto companies, due to their time and cost-efficiency. eToro, for instance, is set to go public through a merger with FinTech Acquisition Corp. V. The fintech Social Finance, Inc., (SoFi), also plans to follow in these footsteps.
Despite the recent Chinese regulatory crackdown on cryptocurrencies and their mining, exchanges continue to go public. Other than SPAC mergers, crypto exchange platforms have gone public via a direct listing. Coinbase Global Inc (NASDAQ: COIN) finalized its listing on the NASDAQ in early April. Kraken has plans to do the same by the end of 2022.