[2017-12-22] Doing a 180 – Goldman Sachs Goes Crypto

[Terraformer]

The Year of Bitcoin continues to get more interesting, as reports surfaced today that legacy bank Goldman Sachs will open a cryptocurrency trading desk by mid 2018. It’s a momentous occasion for many reasons, but not least of which is the  influence the bank carries in terms of respect within the industry.

Goldman Sachs Sees Summer of Bitcoin 2018

Bloomberg reports that banking institution Goldman Sachs is set to launch a cryptocurrency trading desk by July of next year.

Goldman is mainstream within the mainstream, topped off with some extra mainstream in case anyone was wondering about its mainstream cred. It just doesn’t get any more American banking than the one 150 year old institution. It’s an integral part of any US weighted financial average, including the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) and the S&P 100 and 500 components. It boasts over 35 billion USD in revenue and has enough employees to nearly sell out a professional baseball stadium.  

Take a job at Goldman and there’s a chance you just might end up running Europe’s central bank (Mario Draghi), landing the printing press at the US Treasury (Steven Mnuchin), heading the Bank of England (Mark Carney), or become the prime minister of Australia (Malcolm Turnbull). And should Goldman ever have financial trouble, not to worry: taxpayers will float a cool ten billion dollars in relief just as usual because, well, it’s Goldman!

According to the report, Goldman is “still trying to work out security issues as well as how it would hold, or custody, the assets.”

Goldman Had Been Hinting

Bitcoin has been an increasing topic of conversation at the firm. This month alone, the company hosted a Talks at GS program, and the panel resolution read: “The Evolution of Bitcoin.” The talk included Coin Center’s Jerry Brito and the CEO of 21 Inc, Balaji Srinivasan. They discussed “public policy issues for digital currency, [and] the evolution of Bitcoin and its long-term potential.” And more recently its podcast, Exchanges at Goldman Sachs, episode 80, carried the title: “Tax Reform, Bitcoin, and the Year Ahead for Financials.”

Goldman “is now assembling a team in New York,” Bloomberg continued. “While the bank hasn’t made a decision where to house the desk, one possibility is that it will operate within the fixed-income, currencies and commodities unit’s systematic trading function, which conducts transactions electronically,” the report paraphrases two unnamed sources as having said.

Its CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, has played possum with bitcoin for months now. He first tweeted a mild defense of the world’s most popular cryptocurrency back in October, but of late has been heaping skepticism on bitcoin’s long-term viability. His leadership team also put heavy restrictions on clearing bitcoin futures as CME and Cboe made contract markets.

Whatever the case, 2018, with Nasdaq entering the bitcoin futures market along with Cantor Fitzgerald, and now Goldman open to the decentralized currency, might just make this next year as interesting as 2017 for enthusiasts.

https://news.bitcoin.com/goldman-sachs-goes-crypto/

[davis196]

I`m not very happy with this news.Goldman Sachs is a "shaddy" bank in my eyes and i think that they will try to manipulate the bitcoin price,like they were trying to manipulate interest rates years ago.
Some people think that Goldman Sachs is a big and legit bank and this will bring more new people into investing in bitcoin,but this will be only a short term impact.I want more small businesses to adopt crypto,not the big giants.   

[IconFirm]

I`m not very happy with this news.Goldman Sachs is a "shaddy" bank in my eyes.....

I totally agree. They are probably the most corrupt & shady out of all the banksters - crypto doesn't need them & never will, they should stick to stealing peoples fiat.

[bambazamba]

That is so good to know about the immensee support towards crupto currency . The virtual currencies really needs the support of banks and authority in order to take a higher leap then it already is taking . But the question here is that what would "Golman"  get out of this ? No one does it for charity or for some sort of publicity for other currency that might be a potential threat to them . I hope they clarify their real intentions .

[IconFirm]

The virtual currencies really needs the support of banks and authority in order to take a higher leap then it already is taking

What?  No it doesn't, it never has & it never will.  Bitcoin was designed from the ground up to rid us of banksters & control by "authority" as you call it.

Decentralized & self governing.

Read up about it.

But the question here is that what would "Golman"  get out of this ?

Money, obviously. That's what banks do....

[buwaytress]

The last time someone with the initials JD went all in on crushing crypto, the market (causally or otherwise) dipped, and then went right back up again, providing almost 50% profits to anyone who sold at the announcement, bought back in at the floor, and sold again at its rise - all in one week. I can only imagine how much money stands to be made from anyone who sold Bitcoin a week ago and is preparing to buy back almost 0.4 times more Bitcoin right at this moment.

If I were a conspiracy theorist, I'd say that this Bitcoin flooring to 10k - not to mention all the other alts' drastic dive - is merely prepping up for the big boys to come and play. Forget cash-settled futures, we're going to see serious players come and join us on exchanges, selling, buying, perhaps even challenging the current whales of crypto. Mainstream of the mainstream indeed!

[Slugmonkey]

Great news for crypto but Goldman isn't what it used to be in it's post crisis years. It's still as good as many of it's peers, but rival banks don't banks view it with awe, but rather indifference. And that isn't the Goldman way. We are likened to think that Goldman alumni run the world but since the last five years it's revenue lagged behind the big 4 american rivals by 36%. But still Goldman's biggest problem isn't an image one, but a business one. When  a 150 year old institute is behind you: it is a good day.

[1Referee]

If I were a conspiracy theorist, I'd say that this Bitcoin flooring to 10k - not to mention all the other alts' drastic dive - is merely prepping up for the big boys to come and play.

Be careful, before you know it people will accuse you of being a shill or a fud spreader.

Forget cash-settled futures, we're going to see serious players come and join us on exchanges, selling, buying, perhaps even challenging the current whales of crypto.

I am waiting for the day that entities set up massive funds backed by actual Bitcoin stock, instead of all these traditional trading tools allowing professional entities to speculate on Bitcoin, but without actually owning any. As soon as large players take out massive numbers of coins out of circulation, it will even further lower the already low number of available on-exchange coins. These future markets are a nice first step, because this shows that we are moving forwards. If you told me that we would have future markets available this year, and also reaching nearly $20,000, I would probably have told you to seek mental help. 1900% increases usually only happen in the altcoin market in a matter of a year.