Cryptocurrency prices have trended higher this week with bitcoin recovering to above $97,400 on Thursday. Meanwhile, bitcoin holder Strategy missed earnings expectations late Thursday but raised its outlook for its bitcoin gain this year. Elsewhere, Morgan Stanley reportedly aims to add cryptocurrency trading to its E*Trade platform, and SoFi announced plans this week to bring back crypto investing. Other crypto firms including Coinbase are also pursuing bank licenses.
Strategy, which owns one of the world's largest caches of bitcoin, reported a loss of $16.49 per share, widening from a loss of 31 cents per share.
The earnings were well below FactSet expectations for a loss of 11 cents per share. Revenue declined 3.6% to $111.1 million, also missing estimates for $116.6 million.
The bitcoin treasury and software provider in early April warned that it expects unrealized digital asset losses of $5.91 billion for the first quarter, which will result in a net loss for the period.
Bitcoin has rebounded nearly 18% from its March 31 price around $82,500.
Meanwhile, Strategy acquired another 15,355 bitcoin between April 21 and April 27 for an average purchase price of $92,737, according to recent SEC filings. As of April 28, Strategy holds 553,555 bitcoin with an average purchase price of $68,459 per bitcoin.
Strategy in the earnings report said it achieved a bitcoin gain of $4.1 billion in Q1 with a year-to-date total of $5.8 billion, based on the April 28 price of $95,000. The company also hiked the target for its total 2025 bitcoin gain to $15 billion from $10 billion.
Crypto Banking Push
Morgan Stanley plans a crypto trading feature for its E*Trade platform, Bloomberg reported Thursday. The initiative is still in the early stages, but could launch sometime next year. The bank is reportedly considering partnerships with one or multiple crypto firms to help build out the infrastructure. Bloomberg noted that Morgan Stanley plans to offer trading for popular tokens including bitcoin and ether.
SoFi Technologies CEO Anthony Noto during a Monday interview with CNBC said that the fintech bank will bring back cryptocurrency investing this year due to the "fundamental shift" in the regulatory landscape under the Trump administration. SoFi dropped its crypto investment services in 2023 in order to receive a bank charter. Customers at the time were forced to liquidate their holdings or shift to Blockchain.com. SoFi previously offered access to more than 20 crypto tokens, prior to shuttering the service.
"We're going to re-enter the crypto business, which we had to exit," Noto said. "We'll re-enter the business of allowing our members to invest in cryptocurrency. We want to actually make a bigger, more comprehensive push into cryptocurrency (this time), to include really providing crypto or blockchain capabilities in each product area that we have."
The SoFi announcement comes after the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency on March 7 issued guidance that permits national banks and federal savings associations to participate in the crypto business. The OCC also rescinded a requirement for OCC-supervised institutions to prove they have adequate controls before engaging in such crypto activities.
The crypto activities specifically mentioned by the OCC include asset custody, certain stablecoin activities, and participation in independent node verification networks, including distributed ledgers.
The FDIC and Federal Reserve Board also announced actions in April to allow for greater crypto participation from banks with looser supervision requirements.
Elsewhere, the Wall Street Journal in late April reported that a number of crypto firms are pursuing national or industrial bank charters. The group of crypto players includes Coinbase, Circle, BitGo and stablecoin company Paxos.
Bitcoin Price, Crypto Stock Action
Bitcoin peaked at $97,437 on Thursday, CoinMarketCap data shows, before easing around $96,500 in the afternoon. The price of bitcoin has ranged between $93,000 and $95,000 over the past week, and is up about 28% from its early April low of $75,000.
Bitcoin is now up more than 3% for 2025.
Ethereum is up almost 3% over the past day to trade around $1,850. ETH is down roughly 45% so far this year.
COIN stock ticked lower Thursday. Coinbase has fallen 19% in 2025.
The iShares Bitcoin Trust and other spot bitcoin ETFs advanced 2.7% Thursday. Shares of the group are consolidating with buy points around their Dec. 17 highs.
MSTR stock eased slightly late Thursday after results. Shares pared their Thursday gain to 0.4% after jumping 6% in early trade.
You can follow Harrison Miller for more stock news and updates on X/Twitter @IBD_Harrison
