THE HEDGE FUND KING AND OTHER MAJOR PLAYERS MOVING INTO CRYTPO: A TURNING POINT IN ITS REPUTATION?
According to a Bloomberg report, the billionaire Steven Cohen has invested in Autonomous Partners, a hedge fund founded by Arianna Simpson that is focusing on cryptocurrencies and blockchain related projects.
Steven Cohen is considered one of the most successful hedge fund managers in the world. Mr. Cohen is currently the CEO and President of Point72 Asset Management, a firm with $12.4 billion of AUM in 2018 and has an estimated net worth of $14 billion.
The Bloomberg report, quoting “a person familiar with the matter” as the source, stated a few days ago that Mr. Cohen got involved with the hedge fund Autonomous Partners, founded in 2017 by Arianna Simpson, a venture capitalist and early advocate for cryptocurrencies.
Autonomous Partners is already investing in companies that are operating in the development of cryptocurrencies’ infrastructures, or addressing the issues of blockchain scalability and speeding up crypto financial transactions.
Mr. Cohen’s investment represents primarily an endorsement of Autonomous Partners strategies, focusing on the long-term areas of development in the nascent crypto sector. But it also represents an acknowledgement of the potential still to be unleashed of the cryptocurrencies and crypto assets industry.
This positive outlook at the growth possibilities for a new breed of hedge funds, investing in both traditional markets and cryptocurrencies and blockchain-related companies, is not isolated.
Other major league financial players recently made moves that have reinstated confidence in a field shaken by the regulatory uncertainty that has dominated the last few months.
Yesterday, Goldman Sachs officially announced the appointment of David M. Solomon as its new CEO, following the former Chief Executive Officer Lloyd C. Blankfein stepping down.
David M. Solomon is considered more “keen on bitcoin and crypto” than his predecessor. While talking to Bloomberg TV in China in June, Mr. Solomon opened up to a deeper engagement of Goldman Sachs into crypto trading.
As he pointed out during the interview: “We are clearing some futures around Bitcoin, talking about doing some other activities there, but it’s going very cautiously.” Adding that: “We’re listening to our clients and trying to help our clients as they’re exploring those things too.”
Goldman Sachs announcement came a couple of days after the unlikely news of the other financial giant, BlackRock, involvement in crypto activities. The $6 trillion plus investment firm revealed that it has set up a working group to look into bitcoin, crypto and blockchain related matters.
The news immediately boosted the cryptocurrencies market and came as a shock when you consider that as recently as January, CEO Larry Fink said they represent “more an index of money laundering than anything else.”
Now Mr. Fink has confirmed that BlackRock “has been looking at blockchain technology for several years,” focusing on cryptos and blockchain developments since 2015, as the firm “is recognising potential for shared processes and data across market participants, clearing, settlement and reconciliation and simplified securities issuance.”
Chris Yoo, a portfolio manager at cryptocurrency hedge fund Black Square Capital Management, best summarised the scope of BlackRock move: “As the largest asset manager in the world, its interest in crypto assets could be a catalyst for upward price movement and encourage other asset managers, even with more conservative strategies, to seriously explore investing in the crypto space.”
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Giuseppe Solinas
Chief Editor of Elpis Investments, the first AI-driven Crypto and Traditional Assets Investment Company: www.elpisinvestments.com, info@elpisinvestments.com
Originally published at medium.com on July 18, 2018.
