Drama-rama

Blowing past analysts' expectations, overwhelming NYSE circuitry, Circle's IPO received the ticker-tape-parade treatment on Wall Street yesterday. Some 34 million shares of CRCL quickly found their people, opening at $69 and at one point, intra-day, surging to $103.

Demand was so hot, and prices were shooting up so rapidly, that trading had to be halted at least a few times during the session. The stock closed at about $83, up 168% from its $31 IPO price. In all, the company raised $1.1B in a single day of being available for purchase on the Big Board.

"It's one of the strongest debuts by a crypto-native firm in recent memory," Decrypt said.

Bitcoin sulks into the weekend gut-wrenched and feeling a little less wanted after bouncing up and back between $101K and $106K over the past 24 hours. BTC was $103.7K as of Friday at 7:02 a.m. (EST). 

Spot BTC ETFs bid farewell to nearly $300M on Thursday, a day marred by a super-heated feud between President Trump and Elon Musk whose X-fired shots turned increasingly vicious throughout the afternoon. A full-on Hindenburg flame-out of the once torrid bromance between the Dogefather and the Leader of the Free World jarred many investors who, like the children of a particularly acrimonious divorce, find themselves traumatized by the loss of the kind of foundational love and support to which they've grown so accustomed.

Cointelegraph points out that BTC ETF outflows on Thursday not only coincided with Trump-Musk beefing but also a sharp reversal of the Cryptocurrency Fear & Greed Index, its sensitive needle swinging from “greed” to “fear.”

Tesla shareholders might well be blaming themselves for their fix. Could they have done more to hedge their bets after a May rally? During regular trading hours on Thursday, TSLA shares plunged 14%.

The end of EV tax credits is a provision stuffed into Trump's tax and spending bill, the one dubbed "big and beautiful," and which passed in the House but still needs to pass in the Senate. If it does, asserted JPMorgan analysts, it could dent Tesla’s yearly profits by as much as $1.2B.

TSLA, after yesterday, on a year-to-date basis, is down 25%.

When regular-hours NYSE trading concluded yesterday, Circle had ended the session with a market capitalization of $18.4 billion.

While that's far below Coinbase’s $85B capitalization post-public-debut four years ago, it's well above the $5.4B one sported by eToro following its first day of trading on the Nasdaq last month.

Now get ready for some positive knock-on effects stemming from Circle's smashing debut, said Spartan Group co-founder Casper Johansen. "IPOs release liquidity for early investors," he told Decrypt.

Which, Johansen said, gets shoved back into the system via new VC fundraisings. It also gives Circle a mountain of cash (and shares) with which to pursue M&A deals. That, in turn, gives investors "more confidence," Johansen said.

Circle share demand going into maximum overdrive took some on Wall Street by surprise.

“It’s mostly driven by stablecoin fervor and folks vastly underexposed or sidelined there,” said Tom Dunleavy, a partner at Varys Capital, per Decrypt. “You can't invest in Tether.”

Nevertheless, Tether remains the world’s largest stablecoin issuer. USDT has a market cap of $153B. Circle's USDC has a market cap of $61B.

These days, the USD-pegged stablecoin field is getting crowded as U.S. lawmakers work to establish a legal framework for backing, issuing, maintaining and marketing digital assets that are pegged 1:1 to the dollar.

The "GENIUS" bill pending in Congress would require issuers to offer detailed, audited proof of on-hand reserves and to comply with strict anti-money laundering measures.

In April, Tether CEO Paolo Ardoino insisted that while rivals like Circle are courting institutional adoption in the U.S., USDT will remain focused on emerging markets. Tether has signaled, however, that it may well mint a fresh token that would be specifically tailored to satisfy certain regulatory guard rails, Decrypt said.