Bullish, the cryptocurrency exchange backed by investor Peter Thiel, is seeking to take advantage of investor appetite for crypto shares by filing for an initial public offering (IPO) in the US, according to a report in the Financial Times.
The company has used the same confidential Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) process followed recently by Gemini, which means it’s not required to provide any financial information ahead of the IPO.
Billionaire backers
Bullish, which is also supported by hedge fund billionaires Alan Howard and Louis Bacon, Hong Kong investor Richard Li and Nomura, a Japanese bank, is the latest example in a spate of crypto companies seeking to sell shares to the public in the US. Firms such as Bullish are buoyed by the growth of the IPO market generally this year, as well as the White House’s policy actions and the related publicity for the digital assets sector produced by the Trump family.
Members of the public and corporate investors are clearly interested. In Circle’s recent IPO (link to article), the stock beat initial forecasts to start trading at $31 a share, before surging almost 250% in just three days.
Second time lucky
Bullish has not communicated publicly on the matter. It would be the second time the company has attempted an IPO. The first failed in 2022 because of a regulatory crack-down and an uptick in interest rates. Now the digital assets market is more mature, the conditions look to be more favourable.
The next step will be the SEC’s approval, at which point, if Bullish is indeed going ahead with the IPO, it will release all the details and start drumming up interest from potential investors.
