The Breakdown First Five - Thursday, May 9, 2024

Welcome back to The Breakdown First Five — the 5 most interesting and/or important stories in bitcoin, crypto, and markets to start your day.

5. Core Scientific Back in Black

After struggling through a bankruptcy, bitcoin miner Core Scientific is back in profit. The firm mined 2,825 Bitcoin in Q1, worth around $175M at current prices. This drove quarterly net income of $210M, vastly outstripping last year’s Q1 loss of $400,000. Core mined more Bitcoin in Q1 than any other publicly traded miner. Their CEO said the firm had improved efficiency with new generation miners as well as shoring up the balance sheet by reducing debt. 

4. Robinhood Blowout Earnings

Shrugging off their Wells notice, Robinhood posted a monster beat on earnings. The firm’s crypto division saw a 224% increase in trading volume year-over-year, reaching $36B. That’s two-thirds of Coinbase’s Q1 volume. Volume spiked in March during memecoin mania. Crypto and options trading drove a 59% revenue increase compared to last year. Assets under custody rose to $129B. Record quarterly revenues, net income, and earnings per share. 

3. President Threatens Crypto Veto

President Biden has directly intervened in a crypto vote by threatening to veto the bill to repeal SAB 121. The SEC staff accounting guidance had already been found to be a circumvention of agency procedure by the Office of Government Accountability. Biden said in a statement that the repeal would “inappropriately constrain the SEC’s ability to ensure appropriate guardrails and address future issues”. This is the clearest crypto policy statement we’ve had from the Whitehouse to date. They’re backing the SEC come what may. 

2. House SAB 121 Vote Passes

Despite Whitehouse intervention, the vote still passed. 21 Democrats crossed the floor to vote alongside Republicans. Alongside the usual pro-crypto Dems, House Ag digital assets subcommittee ranking member Caraveo dissentented. Putting aside dogma and defense of the administrative state, the main issue is that SAB 121 isn’t even good policy. It prevents banks from custodying crypto and fails to protect against bankruptcy. This is the line in the sand moment. 

1. Trump Goes Full Crypto

Former President Trump used a meet and greet with NFT holders to debut his new pro-crypto position. Making the status clear, Trump reminded the crowd that “Democrats are very much against it”, singling out Gensler by name. Conversely, Trump said he was “good with it.” This is the first time Trump has mentioned crypto generally and taken an unhedged policy position. Trump said “If you’re in favor of crypto, you better vote for Trump.”