SPAC Set To Merge With Circle, ARK ETF Purchases 6.93 Million Shares Of SPAC

  • ARK Invest purchased about 6.93 million shares of the SPAC worth $70.6 million through the organization’s ARK Fintech Innovation ETF.
  • SPAC is set to merge with Circle, which earlier revealed that it was going public due to the increasing concerns of regulators for stablecoins.
  • The USDC stablecoin is the second-largest stablecoin and sixth-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, which is trading at $0.9994 (at the time of writing).

As per Marketwatch, the ARK Invest of Cathie Wood has bought 6.93 million shares of the SPAC (Special Purchase Acquisition Company). A SPAC is generally established to raise money, and this SPAC is reported to be merging with Circle, a peer-to-peer payments tech company. SPAC shares have been bought for $70.6 million via the organization’s ARK Fintech Innovation ETF (exchange-traded fund). This purchase of shares would signify a new position for the ETF.

The ETFs of ARK Invest have had a history of making heavy purchases in the technology sector, which has been indicated by their activities several times. Earlier in October 2021, when the prices of Robinhood dipped, the ARK Invest’s ETFs bought its shares worth $80 million. Cathie Wood has also been quite aggressive with cryptocurrencies, irrespective of the fact that she passed the opportunity of purchasing the first Bitcoin futures ETF in the month.

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The USD Coin (USDC) is the second-largest stablecoin as per the market capitalization, and its principal operator is Circle. Back in July 2021, Circle revealed its purpose of going public via SPAC with Concord Acquisition Corp in a merging event, which might take the company’s valuation to $4.5 billion. However, the merging event was first set to be finalized by the end of 2021 or in the final quarter of 2021, with the organization being listed on NYSE with the ticker symbol being CRCL.

Regulator’s Concerns Influenced Circle’s Decision

The decision to go public resulted from escalating concerns of regulators concerning stablecoins. Despite the influenced decision, the step was appreciated by the majority of the cryptocurrency industry. The co-founder of St. Gotthard Fund Management AG, a Swiss wealth management organization, Vladimir Vishnevskiy, said that since 2014, USDC has been around and is one of the examples of being a known player which is rewarded for their efforts in the industry.

USDC’s Statistics

The USD Coin is a stablecoin that does not have any max supply cap but a circulating supply of 45.03 billion. The stablecoin has an average trading price of $0.9995 over the past week with an all-time high of $2.35. It is currently trading at $0.9994 after facing a downtrend of 0.05% in the last 24 hours. The stablecoin has a market cap of about $45.2 billion and is ranked at 6th position based on the market capitalization among all cryptocurrencies.

Stablecoins have been and are still facing regulatory attention in the United States. This is due to legislators putting questions on the transparency of the market. Also, the reserve backing U.S. legislators are looking forward to bringing new legislation on cryptocurrencies within a few weeks.

Source: https://www.thecoinrepublic.com/2022/01/16/spac-set-to-merge-with-circle-ark-etf-purchases-6-93-million-shares-of-spac/