Regulators approve Bakkt to sell up to $150 million in securities over three years through a shelf registration.
Regulators have given permission to the cash-strapped cryptocurrency startup Bakkt to sell up to $150 million worth of securities. This announcement comes just one week after the company expressed worries about its balance sheet.
The company announced on February 14 that it had received approval for a “shelf registration,” also referred to as a shelf offering. A business registers a new issue of securities with the Securities and Exchange Commission through this process enabling the gradual sale of securities over time without the need for additional approval each time.
With permission, Bakkt claims it will be able to raise a total of $150 million over the course of three years through one or more offerings. “Bakkt thinks the company will greatly benefit when raising capital in the future from the flexibility of a shelf registration on Form S-3,” the company stated.
Bakkt, a cryptocurrency custody and trading platform disclosed last week that it was low on funds and “might not be able to continue,” despite being viewed as Bitcoin’s “savior” during the 2018 bad market. At the time, Bakkt stated that it was hoping to “fund our long-term vision” by possibly raising more money through the public offering of its registered securities.
Since going public in October 2021, the company has declared net losses in eight consecutive quarters. Despite the cryptocurrency market recovering from a challenging 2022, the company’s financial records indicate that through the first three quarters of 2023, it lost $44.9 million, $50.5 million, and $51.7 million.
Following the company’s disastrous $1.59 billion and $323.9 million losses in the third and fourth quarters of 2022, net losses decreased in 2023. Since Q4 2021, the company has incurred net losses of $2.26 billion. In order to facilitate digital asset transactions and services, Bakkt manages a digital asset trading platform for institutions and has partnered strategically with companies like Starbucks and Amazon Web Services.
Intercontinental Exchange a US-based company owns the New York Stock Exchange, which it launched in 2018. According to Google Finance, Bakkt’s (BKKT) share price rose 7.8% to $1.03 prior to the announcement. So far, it has still decreased by more than 51% in 2024.On October 29, 2021, BKKT hit $42, but it dropped sharply to $3.61 in January of the following year and it soon started to decline continuously.
