Mike Novogratz, CEO of crypto-focused financial services firm Galaxy Digital (GLXY), recently revealed in an interview with Bloomberg that BlackRock (BLK) CEO Larry Fink has been orange-pilled, or converted from being a bitcoin (BTC) nonbeliever into a believer. Novogratz said Fink is the most important thing that happened this year in bitcoin, due to BlackRock’s application to list a spot bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF) in the U.S. in June. “Larry was a nonbeliever. Now he says, ‘Hey, this is going to be a global currency.’ People around the world all trust it,” Novogratz said.
The potential of BlackRock, one of the world’s largest asset management firms, leading the way among a flurry of spot bitcoin ETFs possibly gaining regulatory approval in the U.S. is part of an adoption cycle, in the cryptocurrency industry, Novogratz said. The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has rejected dozens of applications to list spot bitcoin ETFs, a policy that has been seen as a major factor inhibiting wider mainstream crypto adoption. BlackRock’s application included a surveillance-sharing agreement, which is supposed to guard against market manipulation and is considered to make it more acceptable to the SEC.
Novogratz also called Ripple’s recent partial victory over the SEC in their legal battle a victory for crypto because it demonstrated that the rules are nothing close to clear. The judge in the case ruled that the sale of XRP tokens on exchanges and through algorithms did not constitute investment contracts, in contradiction to the SEC’s long-held view.