Today in crypto, Mike Novogratz’s Galaxy reported a $482 million loss in the fourth quarter as the bull market reversed course, emails released by the US Justice Department suggest late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein bought a $3 million stake in Coinbase back in 2014, and Hyperliquid’s Hypercore team has signaled support for a proposal that would see it expand into prediction markets.
Galaxy reports $482 million loss
Galaxy, the digital asset and AI infrastructure company led by Mike Novogratz, reported a $482 million loss in the fourth quarter, citing declining cryptocurrency prices.
The losses were “driven primarily by the depreciation of digital asset prices,” the company said in its earnings report. The price of Bitcoin declined by about 20% during the fourth quarter and has since intensified its selloff, plunging toward $73,000 on Tuesday.
Novogratz told shareholders the downturn reflects a familiar phase of the crypto market cycle, adding that periods of heightened stress have historically been followed by renewed accumulation and recovery.
“I do think that we’re in the lower end of the range [of Bitcoin price],” Novogratz told shareholders. “What I would say is that we’ve been here before. Anyone who’s been in crypto for more than five years realizes that part of the ethos of this whole industry is pain.”
Emails suggest Epstein made $3.2M Coinbase investment in 2014
Newly released US Justice Department emails suggest Jeffrey Epstein gained exposure to early cryptocurrency venture investments through intermediaries, including a reported stake in Coinbase.
The emails suggest an entity linked to Epstein acquired 195,910 Series C shares for a total of $3.25 million when Coinbase was valued at $400 million.
The documents do not indicate that Coinbase executives had direct dealings with Epstein or were aware of the ultimate beneficial owner of the investment at the time.
Later emails in 2018 suggest Epstein sold half his stake for $15 million.
HYPE pops 20% after Hyperliquid team nods prediction markets plan
HYPE gained double digits on Monday after the team behind HyperCore, the core infrastructure powering Hyperliquid’s layer-1 network, said it will support the HIP-4 proposal to expand into prediction markets.
The integration would allow fully collateralized contracts on Hyperliquid, the largest decentralized perpetual futures crypto platform, enabling traders to wager on political elections, sports and other markets.
In an X post on Monday, Hyperliquid said the support was driven by “extensive user demand” for prediction markets and bounded options-like instruments, while adding that HIP-4 could allow other novel applications to be built on Hyperliquid.
HIP-4 outcomes would function like a betting slip with a capped payout, settling within a fixed range without leverage, liquidations, or margin calls.
Hyperliquid said the outcomes trading feature is a “work in progress” and is currently only being tested on testnet. The canonical markets would be denominated in Hyperliquid’s native stablecoin, Hyperliquid USDH (USDH).
The news sent Hyperliquid (HYPE) up 19.5% to $37.14, adding to its 46.9% price rally over the last month while the broader crypto market has pulled back, CoinGecko data shows.
