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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.

Shake Shack Tests Bitcoin Rewards 

Shake Shack (SHAK) is offering Bitcoin as a reward for customers buying food at the fast food chain using Block's (SQ) Cash App, the Wall Street Journal's Ann-Marie Alcantara reported on Thursday, citing Shake Shack executives.

Purchasers will receive 15% of their order back in the form of Bitcoin on any Shake Shack purchase made with Cash Card and by purchasing items via Cash Boost. The burger chain is evaluating whether it can reach younger customer on Cash App and if customers are interested in additional cryptocurrency options.

eBay Considers Crypto Payments 

eBay (EBAY) is weighing adding cryptocurrencies as possible means of payment, and the company could make an announcement at its investor day event on March 10, TheStreet’s Luc Olinga reported Sunday, citing CEO Jamie Iannone.

"We're just completing our transition to manage payments where we're now managing $85 billion of volume on our platform directly," Iannone said, adding that "this gives us the ability to open up new forms of payment...We're not accepting crypto currently." Iannone also said, "on March 10, we're going to go deeper on all of these things, payments, advertising, our focus categories."

Marathon Earnings

On Tuesday, Marathon Digital (MARA) reported fourth quarter earnings per share of 36 cents on revenue of $60.3 million, which compared to analyst estimates of 34 cents and $60.62 million, respectively. The company also reported production of 1,098 self-mined Bitcoin during Q4, a 599% increase from the same period in 2020.

"In 2021, we increased our Bitcoin production 846% year-over-year to 3,197 self-mined BTC as we expanded our mining operations and grew our hash rate 1,790% from January 2021 to December 2021," said Fred Thiel, chairman and CEO.

"While maintenance to the power generating station in Hardin, MT materially impacted our Bitcoin production in November, we still produced 1,098 Bitcoin in the fourth quarter and ended the year with our most productive month to date, producing 484.5 Bitcoin in December alone...We believe Marathon remains well positioned to generate approximately 23.3 Eh/s and for our mining operations to be 100% carbon neutral by early 2023.”

Following the report, B. Riley analyst Lucas Pipes lowered the firm's price target on Marathon Digital to $59 from $74 and kept a Buy rating on the shares. While Bitcoin production of 1,098 was slightly below the previous quarter of 1,252 coins, the operations were impacted by non-recurring maintenance at the Hardin facility, leading to an abnormally low production month in November, Pipes said.

The analyst said that with Hardin now resolved, Marathon sees more consistent performance along with an accelerating ramp-up of miners in Texas.

Marathon also published un-audited Bitcoin production and miner installation updates for February on Friday, reporting production of 360.3 self-mined Bitcoin for the month.

The company increased total Bitcoin holdings to approximately 8,956 BTC with a fair market value of approximately $386.8 million and increased hash rate 8% from the prior month after deploying and energizing 2,800 miners in the month. The existing mining fleet consists of 35,510 active miners producing approximately 3.8 EH/s.

Core Scientific Short Report

In a Thursday report titled "Core Scientific, Inc. (CORZ): Rigged Deals," Culper Research said it is "short Core, as we think Core has wildly oversold both its mining and hosting businesses, which it cobbled together in a series of questionable transactions before dumping it onto the public markets via SPAC.

Core's acquired mining business, Blockcap, was formed in December 2020 with just $58.5 million. On Monday, Core disclosed that its board waived the 180-day lockup on over 282 million shares, making them free to be dumped just five trading days from Friday. We believe this shows insiders have abandoned any pretense of care for minority shareholders.

"We think Core is no exception to what's become a steady drumbeat of egregious projections made by many SPACs. We think both Core's hosting business and its self-mining business have been wildly over-hyped, and it's no wonder that insiders can't even wait six months to clamor for the exits," the report read.

"We also think Core has wildly over-hyped the profitability of its self-mining business, where we estimate all-in breakeven costs of $41,723 per BTC vs. the Company's SPAC claims of $2,700 just in power costs per BTC. As such, we see Core as effectively using public markets to throw good money after bad while insiders set themselves up to dump billions worth of stock."

Coinbase Price Target Lowered 

Compass Point analyst Chris Allen lowered the firm's price target on Coinbase (COIN) to $200 from $325 on Monday. Allen cited the current crypto environment as well as Coinbase's expense outlook for 2022, which factors in a much higher level of investment spend than the analyst had been forecasting. The analyst kept a Neutral rating on the shares and sees more negatives than positives for now.

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. Ideanomics (IDEX), Riot Blockchain (RIOT), Overstock (OSTK), Pareteum (TEUM), and SRAX (SRAX) are other stocks that have been touted or have promoted themselves as a way to play the crypto theme.

Price Action

As of the time of publication, Bitcoin is down, having recently been trading at around $39,422.