BitGo CEO Mike Belshe stated that the cryptocurrency custodian has further acquisitions in the pipeline and anticipates more industry consolidation in the second half of the year, days after the company abandoned its proposed acquisition of Prime Trust.“We’ve got [other acquisitions] pending,” Belshe said on Monday to CoinDesk TV’s First Mover.“Over the next six months, I believe there will be consolidation in the space,” the speaker said. “I haven’t been able to announce them yet.”
On June 22, BitGo canceled the purchase of Prime Trust amid rumors that the target was filing for bankruptcy.Subsequently, Prime Trust was cited by Nevada’s Financial Institutions Division (FID) as having “a shortfall in customer funds” and being unable to fulfill all withdrawal requests this month. based in Palo Alto, CaliforniaBefore the $1.2 billion deal was scrapped in August, BitGo itself came close to being acquired by Mike Novogratz’s cryptocurrency merchant bank Galaxy Digital (GLXY).Other approaches have “from time to time” since Galaxy withdrew, according to Belshe, but BitGo is currently more interested in expanding its business than being acquired by a significant player.
Crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN), which BlackRock (BLK) selected as the custodian for its fund-management unit iShares’ planned bitcoin exchange-traded fund (ETF), is one potential contender in the custody market.Coinbase has a very strong balance sheet and is a publicly traded firm, so it does receive some of those first movers, according to Belshe.To differentiate its custody service from its trading operation, Coinbase may eventually be forced to do so.
“These are not custodians, these are exchanges. Coinbase is going to have to choose which side of the fence they want to be on,” he said.
Belshe noted that BitGo is “talking to pretty much every big deal that’s out there” and that BlackRock CEO Larry Fink has his phone number.