Home The Cointelegraph Top 100 2023 Mike Novogratz

#48

Mike Novogratz

Founder and CEO of Galaxy Digital

Understanding the phrase “think before you ink”

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“Over the next decade, Web3 and blockchains will reshape industries, communities and the internet as we know it, blurring the lines between our physical and digital realities.”

Biography:

Mike Novogratz is the founder and CEO of Galaxy Digital, a crypto investment firm that offers institutions and direct clients a broad range of financial solutions spanning the ecosystem of digital assets. Novogratz is a former hedge fund manager who previously worked as a chief investment officer at the Fortress Investment Group from 2002 to 2015. Before joining the company, Novogratz was a partner at Goldman Sachs, operating from the Tokyo office, where he was tasked with selling Japanese government bonds to American investors.

Eventually, he was posted to Hong Kong, where he ran a trading desk for the financial services company. He was elected partner at the firm in 1998 and later appointed president of Goldman Sachs’ Latin America division. Novogratz went on to found Galaxy Digital in 2018 to capitalize on the growing interest in the digital currency market by providing institutional-grade infrastructure and services.

Novogratz’s 2022:

2022 was an eventful year for Galaxy Digital and Novogratz. A staunch proponent of the blockchain industry, the crypto mogul frequently voiced his beliefs about the long-term growth of Bitcoin. In December, he downgraded his Bitcoin prediction, which he had previously forecasted would climb to $500,000 within five years, citing pressure from Federal Reserve interest hikes.

Earlier in the year, he supported a number of projects, including Terra — investing $25 million in developer Terraform Labs and even getting a LUNA tattoo. He later acknowledged that he’d made a mistake after the project’s flawed market dynamics led to its collapse. He also explained that the decision to invest in Terra was based on key metrics such as increased developer engagement, growing investor support and considerable network activity.

Novogratz has consistently managed to diversify his company’s investments to minimize risks and position the company for success over the long term. In December, he announced the acquisition of Argo Blockchain’s crypto mining facility in Texas for $65 million. The money helped Argo avoid bankruptcy while allowing Galaxy Digital to enter the cryptocurrency mining business. 

Novogratz’s 2023:

Novogratz will likely put more money into innovative crypto projects in 2023 and continue to bail out flailing startups with significant potential, just as he did in 2022.

His investment firm will likely favor crypto custodial businesses in 2023, as it has in the past two years. In the fourth quarter of 2022, his investment firm won an auction to buy GK8 from the bankrupt Celsius Network for $44.1 million — a discount of over 60% compared with the $115 million originally paid by Celsius.

Before this, Galaxy Digital had entered into talks with BitGo, a digital asset custody firm, to merge. The deal, however, fell through, and his company seemingly opted to acquire GK8 instead. Such acquisitions are likely to continue into 2023.