Morgan Stanley Considers Acquiring Bithumb Crypto Exchange

Morgan Stanley considers acquiring the Bithumb crypto exchange according to a report by a South Korean media outlet that we have in our crypto news today.

The news surfaced two days after the American banking giant decided to offer BTC funds to its clients via its traditional investment platform. BTC surged above $61,000 on the high institutional demand, which is an increase of more than 1500% from the March low. It seems that the report from the Naver media outlet revealed that Morgan Stanley considers acquiring Bithumb, suggesting that the bank will invest up to $442 million into the exchange based on the comments from an exchange representative.

Wow.

Morgan Stanley is reportedly bidding for Bithumb, South Korea's top crypto and bitcoin exchange, for $2 billion valuation.

Slowly, then surely.

The explosiveness of institutional interest in this space right now is unprecedented.

— Joseph Young (@iamjosephyoung) March 19, 2021

Morgan Stanley entered a discussion with Bident which is an entity that holds a 10.3% stake in Bithumb to acquire the stakes in the exchange. Bident is a KOSDAQ company that saw its share surge one day after the prospects of its potential deal with Morgan Stanley. The reason the bank used Bident is quite clear especially since Bident has the right to negotiate a preferred sale to purchase Bithumb Holdings as one source commented.

Market analyst Joseph Young revealed in a tweet that Morgan Stanley could bid $2 billion for Bithumb adding that the global investment giant’s deal with South Korea’s crypto exchange seems unprecedented due to the institution’s interest in the BTC space. The comments appeared right as CNBC reported that the bank has an interest in offering three BTC funds to its wealthy clients via its traditional investment infrastructure:

“Two of the funds on offer are from Galaxy Digital, a crypto firm founded by Mike Novogratz, while the third is a joint effort from asset manager FS Investments and bitcoin company NYDIG. Morgan Stanley’s announcement to offer bitcoin to their clients ($5T) in April ushers in a new era. A tidal wave of money is about to flow into bitcoin. Every major bank will follow. Nothing will ever be the same.”

BTC increased by more than 1500% in the past 12 months as it hit the highest levels above $61K when the investors started exploring the cryptocurrency for its anti-inflation features. The bulls anticipated that the exchange rate will reach $100K by the years’ end especially since Tesla added $1.5 billion worth of BTC to its balance sheets.