New York Post, Tuesday, December 1, 2020nypost.comBy ThorNToN McENEryThe price of Bitcoin hit a record
high on Monday as investors increas-
ingly scoop up risky assets amid the
topsy-turvy pandemic economy.
The controversial cryptocurrency’s
value hit an all-time peak of $19,864.15,
shattering its previous high-water
mark of $19,783.21 which was set in
December 2017. Bitcoin pulled back
off the highs and closed at $19,688.Bitcoin has gained more than 170
percent this year, with most of that
growth coming since September. In-
vestors cite demand for riskier assets
amid unprecedented fiscal and mon-
etary stimulus, hunger for assets per-
ceived as resistant to inflation and ex-
pectations that cryptocurrencies will
win mainstream acceptance as pay-
ment companies including PayPal
and Square have allowed their use.
This most recent crypto craze isbenefiting from a pandemic-marred
market reality in which stocks are
trading at nosebleed prices while
bond yields are around zero. That
combination has created a new class
of crypto investor that views assets
like Bitcoin in a whole new light.
“You need to put your money some-
where,” Marc van der Chijs, a long-
time crypto investor and founder of
First Block Capital, told The Post.
“Bonds have no yield, keeping it incash is dangerous. People used to put
their money in gold, but gold is going
down. It looks like people are taking
their money out of gold and putting it
into bitcoin.”
Crypto mavens like van der Chijs
also believe that this market will help
this new rally last much longer than
the 2017 surge that lost steam and half
its value within days of hitting its high
mark. With wires
[email protected]By ThorNToN McENEryForget “Government Sachs”
— it’s BlackRock that’s shaping
up to be Wall Street’s new ele-
phant inside the White House.
President-elect Joe Biden is
raising eyebrows with chatter
that he’s poised to name two
executives from BlackRock --
the asset-management colos-
sus headed by billionaire Larry
Fink, with more than $7 trillion
in holdings — for top posts on
his economic team.
Reports swirled over the
weekend that Biden has settled
on Brian Deese, a current
BlackRock exec and former
Obama adviser, to lead the Na-
tional Economic Council. On
Sunday, the transition team
said it had chosen Adewale
“Wally” Adeyemo, a former
chief of staff to Fink at Black-
Rock who is currently presi-
dent of the Obama Foundation,
to be deputy to Treasury Secre-
tary nominee Janet Yellen.
Meanwhile, executives at
Goldman Sachs — which over
the years earned the moniker
“Government Sachs” for the
ranks of its top executives who
have landed in the White
House, including Gary Cohn
and Steven Mnuchin in the
Trump administration — have
been conspicuously absent on
Biden’s lists, insiders say.
“What Larry is doing is very
smart, very him,” said one
hedge fund manager familiar
with Fink. “Goldman andother banks have sent their
people into government,
whereas Larry took these guys
from the White House, worked
with them, backed Biden, and
now he’s putting them back
into the White House.”
Despite his vocal endorse-
ment of various liberal
causes, 68-year-old billion-
aire Fink and his fund have
become the preferred whip-ping posts for the left. Black-
Rock’s investments in private
prisons and weapons manu-
facturers have made Fink a
target for protesters who have
ambushed him at conferences
and demanded that he be re-
moved from the boards of the
Museum of Modern Art and
the Whitney.
Still, Fink was one of the few
Wall Street titans to publiclysupport Biden during the elec-
tion, with some rumors circu-
lating that he had his eye on
Treasury or the National Eco-
nomic Council role that Deese
now looks poised to fill. With-
out joining the White House
himself, having BlackRock
alums in Biden’s ear could be
helpful to Fink as the economy
recovers from the coronavirus.
Deese, 42, is not a trainedeconomist, but he played a key
role throughout the Obama
administration working on ev-
erything from the auto bailout
to the Paris Climate Agree-
ment to Merrick Garland’s
failed nomination to the Su-
preme Court. After Trump’s
inauguration, Deese joined
BlackRock as Global Head of
Sustainable Investing. That
role puts him in control of one
of Fink’s pet projects: making
climate change a key talking
point for BlackRock.
“Larry is the new Goldman
Sachs,” said one investment
banker. “Deese is not necessa-
rily a ‘BlackRock guy,’ but he
works for Larry and now he
advises the president.”
For decades, banks like
Goldman Sachs were the key
focus of politicians and regula-
tors, especially after the 2008
crisis. Having former Gold-
man execs in top government
roles was good for both Gold-
man and the sector as a whole.
But as banks shift into a
more utility-like future, non-
banks like BlackRock that
work in the more potent as-
set management and private-
equity spheres will come un-
der more scrutiny.
“The issue isn’t that the
banks don’t understand what
the rules are,” Federal Reserve
Chair Jay Powell said in June- “The issue is that the risk
isn’t in the banks. It’s out in
those market-based vehicles.”
[email protected]
Risky bettors send Bitcoin soaring
Post photo illustration$ome month
Stocks slipped but
closed out November
with hefty gains, cap-
ping a furious month-
long rally fueled by
bets that COVID-19
vaccines are close to
being approved. The
Dow rose 12 percent,
marking its best month
since January 1987.Hot data
S&P Global agreed to
buy rival financial data
provider IHS Markit for
$44 billion in the larg-
est merger deal of the
year. The massive all-
stock tie-up unites one
of the industry’s oldest
firms with a younger
competitor that has
seen rapid growth.Tech trouble
Big Tech’s legal woes
are expected to
worsen in the coming
weeks as federal and
state antitrust authori-
ties prepare to file as
many as four new law-
suits against Facebook
and Alphabet’s Google.Knock, knock
DoorDash said it
plans to sell 33 million
shares priced between
$75 and $85 a share in
an initial public offer-
ing that could give the
food-delivery com-
pany a valuation of as
much as $32 billion.Chase freeze
JPMorgan Chase plans
to freeze salaries for
most employees with ti-
tles of vice president
and above even as it ex-
pects to increase bo-
nuses for some traders.
Sources: AP, Dow
Jones and ReutersBusiness
Briefs
Follow us on
@NYPOSTBIZ
It’s BIden’s ’Rock
Eyes Fink’s fund to build econ team
Business
Dow
Jones
Indust.
Avg.Down
271.7329,638.64Nasdaq
Comp.Down
7.1112,198.74Major investment
President-elect Joe
Biden appears to be
surrounding himself
with key players
from BlackRock, the
asset-management
giant run by Larry
Fink (near right),
making “Larry the
new Goldman Sachs”
in the White House,
one investment
banker said.