Summary Bullish had a highly successful IPO, raising $1.1B which signaled strong investor appetite for crypto assets. The platform offers a comprehensive suite of crypto trading and data services, competing with companies like Binance, Coinbase and Robinhood. Bullish's profitability is tied to crypto market volatility. The firm lost money in Q1'25, but was profitable in the previous two fiscal years. The GENIUS Act and growing institutional adoption create a favorable regulatory and growth environment for Bullish. However, shares of Bullish are highly valued, leading to an unappealing risk profile for investors. The stock market has a new digital currency platform that offers exposure to the crypto ecosystem: Bullish ( BLSH ) had a widely successful IPO on Wednesday with shares surging on the first day of trading. The crypto trading platform and analytics company raised $1.1B in its IPO this week, selling shares at a price of $37. Bullish opened at $90 on Wednesday and shares ended the day at $68, showing an impressive first-day gain of 84%. Bullish's market debut followed an equally impressive IPO of stablecoin issuer Circle Internet Group ( CRCL ) earlier this year and showed that investors still have a strong appetite for assets in the cryptocurrency space. The cryptocurrency company now has a market cap of $10.3B and has considerable potential for long term growth in a market that is seeing growing institutional adoption of digital assets and benefiting from an increasingly pro-crypto regulatory environment. However, shares are highly valued and investors are likely to fall into a "FOMO" trap after such outsized first-day gains. The best course of action, in my opinion, is to stay on the sidelines given Bullish's now high revenue-based valuation factor. Seeking Alpha A new crypto play for investors Bullish offers investors a host of cryptocurrency-related services including a digital currency trading platform (for both spot and future trading) as well as data aggregation and analytics services through its information services business Coindesk. Like Coinbase Global ( COIN ), Bullish offers investors access to the largest digital assets in the cryptocurrency market and the platform is an investor in cryptocurrencies itself. Bullish had a $647B spot trading volume in Q1 ’25, on a trailing-twelve months basis, according to its F-1 registration statement with the SEC and is one of the largest crypto platforms in the U.S. The platform also owned about 24,000 Bitcoin ( BTC-USD ) valued at $2.9B as of the end of the first-quarter. In terms of its core business, Bullish competes mainly with companies like Binance and Coinbase, but also trading powerhouse Robinhood ( HOOD ) and, to some extent, SoFi Technologies ( SOFI ) which is adoption a cryptocurrency-focused growth strategy. Bullish As I explained with respect to Coinbase, see here , cryptocurrency trading platforms are notorious for their revenue and earnings unpredictability. The cryptocurrency market is highly volatile which effects the general profitability of marketplaces that offer trading services. Bitcoin-related trading will remain key to Bullish as the world's number one digital asset by market cap is responsible for the lion share of trading activity on the company's platform. Bitcoin trading represented 47% of the platform's trading value of $229.5M in the first-quarter. Bullish Not surprisingly, Bullish was widely profitable last year as the market saw a major recovery in the Bitcoin price and a surge in trading volumes. In the first-quarter of FY 2025, the trading platform incurred a loss of $348.6M while the company made a profit in the year-earlier period of $104.8M. However, Bullish has had two consecutive years of net income profitability in FY 2023 and FY 2024. SEC - Bullish Bullish and other cryptocurrency companies are set to be beneficiaries of the GENIUS Act that was signed into law by President Trump last month as it creates a pro-crypto regulatory framework for stablecoin issuers. Stablecoins are an important pillar of the cryptocurrency market as they are digital assets whose values are pegged to the U.S. Dollar. As such, investors can easily move in and out of more volatile digital assets and park their capital in stablecoins. Additionally, cryptocurrencies can be staked (invested), allowing investors to earn a return on them. I also recently cited the GENIUS Act as a potential earnings driver for Coinbase as the platform achieves significant growth in its stablecoin-related revenues. I also highlighted the importance of the GENIUS Act legislation in my June work on Circle Internet which you can read here . Bullish’s valuation Bullish had $214M in adjusted revenue in FY 2024 -- according to page 179 of the F-1 registration statement, which, assuming a comparable level of revenue this year, translates to a P/S ratio of 47.0X. Assuming a moderate 20% growth rate for the platform's top line this year, Bullish could be on track to generate ~$257M in revenue... which would translate to a price-to-revenue ratio of 39.0X... which is still very high. For comparison, Coinbase is trading at a P/S ratio, based off of FY 2025 expected revenue, of 11.3X... making the trading platform significantly cheaper than Bullish. Given this very stretched valuation and strong post-IPO performance, I would not consider jumping in at this point. Shares are very valued and with investor optimism surging following the Bullish listing, I believe the best action would be to stay on the sidelines until the volatility has shaken out. Risks with Bullish Bullish is chiefly a cryptocurrency trading platform, but also offers data services. The trading platform will be reliant on trading activity in retail in institutional markets which in turn depends on the volatility in crypto markets, so investors could see drastically changing performance metrics, depending on how active traders are in the market. A decrease in volatility therefore is likely a negative for trading platforms like Bullish and Coinbase Global. Since the company also owns a sizable chunk of Bitcoin, a drop in the price of the digital asset could negative affect the company's financial performance as well. Final thoughts Bullish had a very successful first day of trading, with shares up a massive 84%. The cryptocurrency platform is also operating in a fast-growing market with considerable momentum led by Bitcoin which is still trading near all-time highs. While Bullish's platform profitability depends on overall market volatility, the crypto enterprise is clearly tapping into a promising market that has recently seen a drastically improving regulatory environment with the passing of the GENIUS Act. While Bullish operates in a rapidly evolving ecosystem that is seeing pro-crypto regulation, I believe the valuation here is very high based off of expected revenue for the current year. I don't see a very attractive risk profile here given the massive 84% gain on the first day of trading and initiate Bullish as a hold.
