As bitcoin, ethereum and other cryptocurrencies get increasing attention from investors, Wall Street and its traditional banks continue to adjust to the shift. Catch up on this week's top stories highlighting the intersection of these old guard and new school areas of finance with this recap compiled by The Fly.

PAYPAL TO LET CUSTOMERS WITHDRAW CRYPTO

PayPal (PYPL) blockchain lead Jose Fernandez da Ponte said the internet payments company will let users withdraw cryptocurrency to third-party wallets, CoinDesk's Benedict George reported Wednesday. Speaking at CoinDesk's Consensus 2021 conference, da Ponte told moderator Jeff John Roberts that a withdrawal function is in the works. At present, PayPal does not let users move cryptocurrency holdings off-platform. “We want to make it as open as possible, and we want to give choice to our consumers, something that will let them pay in any way they want to pay,” da Ponte said. “They want to bring their crypto to us so they can use it in commerce, and we want them to be able to take the crypto they acquired with us and take it to the destination of their choice.”

IRAN BANS BITCOIN MINING

Iran President Hassan Rouhani said that the country's government is banning the mining of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies as officials blame the energy-intensive process for blackouts in a number of the country's cities, CNBC's Natasha Turak reported Wednesday. Rouhani told state TV that the ban is effective immediately and will remain in place until September 22. The move comes after Tehran and several other large cities faced multiple daily power outages over the past few months.

MICROSTRATEGY CEO MEETS WITH MUSK, BITCOIN MINERS

Michael Saylor, the founder and CEO of MicroStrategy (MSTR), tweeted Monday: "Yesterday I was pleased to host a meeting between @elonmusk & the leading Bitcoin miners in North America. The miners have agreed to form the Bitcoin Mining Council to promote energy usage transparency & accelerate sustainability initiatives worldwide." The tweet came after Tesla (TSLA) CEO Elon Musk tweeted Monday, “Spoke with North American Bitcoin miners. They committed to publish current & planned renewable usage & to ask miners WW to do so. Potentially promising.”

COINBASE ANNOUNCES BETA LAUNCH OF COINBASE PRIME

Coinbase (COIN) said Tuesday it is launching the beta version of Coinbase Prime, its prime brokerage solution that provides custody, advanced trading, data analytics, and prime services. "Coinbase Prime, separate from Coinbase Exchange, was built with the specific requirements and services clients need to participate in digital assets. Whether you're a financial institution, institutional investor, or company looking to add crypto to your balance sheet, Coinbase Prime has the tools and services you need," the company said. Coinbase also announced Thursday a new section of its blog called “Fact Check”. CEO Brian Armstrong said, “We will use this section of the blog to combat misinformation and mischaracterizations about Coinbase or crypto being shared in the world...Crypto is a rapidly emerging space with growing attention and focus on it right now. Unfortunately, with this attention comes a lot of misinformation that is damaging, not only for companies like Coinbase, but for the space broadly. We want to do our best to ensure that when a customer, a regulator, or another important stakeholder is doing their research on crypto that they're seeing information that is accurate and objective.”

RIOT, MARATHON INITIATED WITH BUY

B. Riley analyst Lucas Pipes initiated coverage of Riot Blockchain (RIOT) and Marathon Digital (MARA) on Wednesday with Buy ratings and price targets of $43 and $47, respectively. While challenges exist for the crypto mining space due to bitcoin price volatility, the analyst sees "significant opportunities" from current levels for miners that have the infrastructure in place and that can build scale. Pipes estimates "highly attractive" returns on invested capital, or ROICs, for digital miners that have access to equipment and low-cost electricity. The analyst highlighted that Riot is a well-established crypto miner with a leading position from a capacity perspective and has recently acquired the 300 MW Whinstone facility in Texas from Northern Data for $80M in cash and 11.8M shares. The company plans to have more than 70,000 miners in place by year-end 2022, which Pipes believes may bring expansion into the Whinstone facility, which is expandable to 750 MW of capacity. The analyst also thinks that other strategic initiatives are possible, and sees the recent appointment of CEO Jason Les as a "clear positive" given his strong background and expertise in the space.

Regarding Marathon Digital, Pipes pointed out that the company is a well-established digital asset miner with a leading position in terms of mining equipment procurement and operations. Marathon plans to have over 100,000 miners in place by year-end 2022, which may bring expansion of its physical presence outside of its core Hardin, MT, facility into play, as evidenced by Monday's binding letter of intent with Compute North, he contended. The analyst believes the launch of a North American mining pool and other strategic initiatives are likely to enhance the Marathon story. Additionally, he sees the recent appointment of CEO Fred Thiel as a "clear positive" given his strong background and expertise in the space.

CRYPTO STOCK PLAYS

Cryptocurrency revenues have been pointed to as reasons to be bullish on Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) and Nvidia (NVDA) in select research. Overstock (OSTK), Ideanomics (IDEX), Pareteum (TEUM) and SRAX (SRAX) are other stocks that have been touted, or promoted themselves, as a way to play the crypto theme.

PRICE ACTION

As of time of writing, bitcoin increased slightly this week to $36,887 in U.S. dollars, according to TradeBlock.