Mike Novogratz’s Galaxy Digital, a cryptocurrency and blockchain focussed merchant bank, has posted a loss of $134 million for the first quarter of 2018.
According to the company’s quarterly disclousre, the bank experienced several serious losses during a rough first quarter for cryptocurrencies.
With $85.5 million of unrealised losses on digital assets an the trading business recording $13.5 million of losses, the CEO did not seem fazed by the figures, instead looking to the future for the firm:
I am very proud of the progress that we have made since the beginning of the year.We have assembled a world-class team with deep institutional knowledge and expertise and have also made significant strides in scaling our four core business lines. I have complete confidence in our team's ability to continue driving growth and believe the Company is strategically positioned to help further institutionalize the digital assets and blockchain technology industry.
The financial statements are the first to be released by Galaxy Digital – formed in November of last year, and come to fulfil a precondition of Novogratz’s planned listing on Toronto’s TSX Venture Exchange.
Bitcoin Bull
Novograt’s statements following the quarterly reports are unsurprising given the investor’s repeatedly bullish predictions for bitcoin and the terrible quarter experienced by nearly all cryptocurrencies.
Giving the keynote speech last week at Blockchain Week Korea, Novogratz explained why he remains bullish on bitcoin and the cryptocurrency space – saying that a “herd of institutional investors” is coming towards the crypto ecosystem and that they are:
slowly coming to the realization that blockchain will be internet or Web 3.0.
While bitcoin plummeted more than 50% in the first three months of the year, in the last two weeks bitcoin has bucked the bearish trend pushing past $8,000 for the first time since May.
With Galaxy Digital having invested $86.8 million in 11 investments and six add-on acquisitions already in 2018 – it is clear that Novogratz is looking beyond the short-term movements in price and focussing on the long-term future of the blockchain space.
