a) build a centralized crypto exchange
b) Require KYC
c) write trades etc. to EOS blockchain
c) have an AMM that provides on the exchange with the $6b of crypto Bullish owns
d) let users provide in the AMM too
(it's not live yet)
7) So basically, Bullish going to is a standard exchange, except that it'll use it's $6b of capital to provide a bunch of liquidity.
Is that worth $3B?
You can be the judge of that.
8) What about that liquidity providing?
Well let's dive into an example.
They have ~$5B of BTC on hand, and ~$1B of cash.
Let's say they raise more and end up putting $1B each of USD and BTC in a BTC/USD pool, using x*y=k.
Then, the pool has ~$5m offered within 1%.
9) Right now, ftx.com/trade/BTC-PERP has roughly 900 BTC offered within 1%, or about $30m.
So while the Bullish treasury will help with liquidity, it won't be enough to make it top tier.
How much will that providing cost in IL?
10) They're assuming 75% annualized BTC volatility, which isn't crazy.
If BTC goes up 75% this year, ignoring fees/spreads:
Without providing: $1B USD, $1.75B BTC = $2.75B
With providing/IL: $1.32 USD, $1.32B BTC = $2.64B
So it's paying ~$100m/year to get 20% of FTX's depth
11) Which means paying $500m/year in impermanent loss to get top tier liquidity for BTC/USD.
Maybe $1B/year for all their books combined.
That's..... a lot to pay.
12) Which is just a way of saying that, usually, exchanges don't scale up liquidity by just putting out never-moving scales with their internal capital.
Ok, so what's up with Bullish's "illustrative" P&L?
(a) ignoring IL
(b) assuming that customers are paying 16bps to trade
(c) assuming $1b/day of volume
(d) assuming they have $2.5B of USD to provide with (for BTC/USD--and more for others)
Wouldn't we all love to have those!
14) Also, just for fun, here's a chart of competitors' 2023 EV/EBITDA.
I love these charts! Though somehow they bury the lede: if I knew every company's 2023 EBITDA, I would go bet on stock and crypto prices, not think of relative exchange valuations.
15) But anyway, maybe this is all besides the point.
Bullish seems to be comparing itself to Bakkt and Coinbase, but maybe that's not really what it is.
Maybe Bullish is really another MicroStrategy.
16) Create a company, put $6B of crypto in it, SPAC it at $9B, and now people have a way to buy crypto with their brokerage accounts at a 50% premium.
Maybe they will!
17) I guess we'll see exactly how bullish the world feels.
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2) There are a ton of ways that we can work with others!
From ftx.com/pay to FTX whitelabels to ftx.com/nfts to liquidity to otc.ftx.com to branding to investments to advising, our surface area is only growing.
3) The potential of our partnerships gets bigger each day.
This also means, though, that we're unlikely to be able to guess everything ahead of time.
And so when we partner with people, a _bit_ thing we try to figure out is: