Bitcoin bull and independent research boutique, Fundstrat, reveals its new five indexes to monitor cryptocurrencies. Aimed at institutional investors, FS Crypto FX indexes are the most recent and prominent speculation instruments and a first for Wall Street insiders.
Bitcoin 55K USD in 5 Years
After bitcoin reached gold parity in Spring, highly cited Wall Street prophet Thomas Lee’s, A framework for valuing bitcoin as a substitute for gold, caught media fire.
In it, Mr. Lee, co-founder of Fundstrat Global Advisors (FGA), explicitly concluded “bitcoin’s value per unit could be $20,000 to $55,000 by 2022.”
Divination is nothing new in the cryptocurrency space, but Mr. Lee, former analyst for JPMorgan Chase, was the first well-known trader to dabble so flagrantly.
Taking-on the standard for value, gold, was an equally gutsy move for a vested financial guru.
That bitcoin has since nearly doubled has only buttressed his legend.
Talk Meets Walk
Cryptoassets, essentially classifying cryptocurrencies as stand-alone equities or commodities, even basket-ing them like a mutual fund, are the financial sector’s latest attempt to mainstream digital currency.
Summer of this year saw Roger Bryan’s Digital Currency Index (DCI) become essentially an industry benchmark. It weights by price, taking an average of 30 digital currencies traded on Kraken and Bittrex. Listed currencies are determined by market capitalization, and recalculated every quarter (three months).
More recently, William Mougayar announced his eponymous High Growth Cryptoassets Index (WMX). His index uses “strategic selection” to place over one dozen currencies in order of weighted rank percentage.
Both DCI and WMX are available as products.
Thomas Lee Toe Dip
Fundstrat’s Mr. Lee continues to make headline howling predictions, asserting bitcoin’s trading volume could overtake that of Apple.
Daily trading of top cryptocurrencies is getting close to 4 billion USD, surprising many finance professionals and, again, aiding in Thomas Lee’s prophetic street cred.
Trading volume of the present sort could mean there is wide interest and relative excitement.
Due to the potential of both, FGA announced its own set of research indexes, FS Crypto FX. All five would measure the market’s viability and vibrancy over time.
Think of them as crypto’s answer to the S&P 500 (FGA’s indexes add up to over 600 digital currencies).
CNBC’s intrepid reporter, Evelyn Cheng, who covers Thomas Lee extensively, was able to get a breakdown of FGA indexes:
FS Crypto 10 — tracks the 10 largest and most liquid digital currencies including bitcoin, ethereum, ripple, litecoin, dash, IOTA and monero.
FS Crypto 40 — tracks the top 11 to 50 digital currencies by market value and liquidity including NEM, bitconnect and Lisk.
FS Crypto 250 — tracks the top 51 to 300 cryptocurrencies by market value and liquidity including BitcoinDark, Singular DTV and FirstCoin.
FS Crypto 300 — tracks the 300 largest digital currencies by market value and liquidity.
FS Crypto Aggregate — tracks the performance of 630 digital currencies.
For all his seeming bravado, this is but a toe dip for Mr. Lee. None of FGA’s indexes are purchasable.
More importantly, institutional investor service providers such as Mr. Lee’s company are an important first step for Wall Street to formally enter the bitcoin ecosystem in a big way.
What do you think? Are cryptocurrency indexes a sign of anything significant? Are Mr. Lee’s predictions particularly sound? Tell us in the comments below.
Images courtesy of: Fundstrat, Jure Makovec Times.si.
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