Former NYSE Chairman Tom Farley’s SPAC to Merge with Bullish to Make Planned Crypto Exchange Public

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Thomas farley

Anjali Sundaram | CNBC

Crypto startup Bullish plans to go public in a reverse merger with the special-purpose acquisition company backed by Tom Farley, the former chairman of the New York Stock Exchange.

Farley’s Far Peak Acquisition Corporation SPAC jumped about 4% on the news.

The deal, announced Friday, is expected to be completed by the end of 2021 and Farley, who oversaw the NYSE from 2014 to 2018, will become CEO of Bullish when that happens.

Bullish expects to receive around $ 600 million in proceeds from Far Peak, plus an additional $ 300 million through a PIPE or private investment in public stocks. A host of high-profile investors are participating in PIPE, including BlackRock, the world’s largest asset manager, and Galaxy Digital, Mike Novogratz’s crypto-focused financial services firm.

The merger between Far Peak and Bullish involves a pro forma net worth of around $ 9 billion, according to a press release.

Bullish intends to launch “a revolutionary and regulated cryptocurrency exchange” later this year, with a private pilot program starting in the coming weeks, according to the press release. The exchange will provide “deep and predictable liquidity with technology that allows retail and institutional investors to generate a return on their digital assets,” the statement said.

Bullish started in May as a subsidiary of Block.one, a blockchain company with the backing of well-known investors including Peter Thiel, PayPal co-founder and prominent venture capitalist.

Thiel’s companies, Thiel Capital and Founders Fund, participated in Bullish’s capital increase in May. Other investors in Bullish include British hedge fund manager Alan Howard, Galaxy Digital and Richard Li, a billionaire businessman from Hong Kong.

The institutional adoption of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies has been a big topic over the past year. Companies like Tesla and Square have invested in bitcoin to maintain their balance sheets, and major Wall Street banks have taken steps to provide wealth management clients with exposure to digital assets.

In April, the most popular U.S. cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase, went public through a direct listing on the Nasdaq, a development that was touted as a turning point for the nascent but rising industry.

Coinbase’s debut on the public market coincided with Bitcoin’s current high of nearly $ 65,000 per unit. However, the world’s largest cryptocurrency by market value has struggled since then due to a number of factors, including the Chinese government stepping up its crackdown on crypto. Bitcoin traded below $ 33,000 on Friday morning. Last month it briefly dipped below $ 29,000 where it started the year.

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies such as Ether operate on decentralized digital ledgers called blockchains. While the digital asset industry has its fierce critics, its supporters see the potential to disrupt traditional finance with the use of so-called smart contracts and other blockchain-related innovations.

In an interview with CNBC in April, Farley said he believed the crypto space to be “the world’s best kept secret and possibly the history of the financial markets.” He added: “I think it’s fascinating. I think it’s here to stay. We are past the point of no return.”

In 2015, while Farley was still president, the New York Stock Exchange made a minority investment in Coinbase.

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