November Market Recap: EV Shares, Bitcoin & Metaverse

Let’s delve into each, one by one.

The Cryptocurrency Market

Events in the cryptocurrency market in the month of November range from regulatory concerns around Bitcoin BTC (and, by extension, other cryptocurrencies) to the increasing popularity of meme coins such as Dogecoin DOGE and Shiba Inu SHIB. Congress members have been divided about the possible effects on the Dollar. While the former Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, derided cryptocurrencies, Cynthia Lummis, a senator from Wyoming, on the other hand, believes that Bitcoin could be the perfect solution to the inflation tailspin that began when the United States Dollar (USD) was taken off the gold standard in 1971. That way, Senator Lummis seems to be a Bitcoin maximalist.

In another development, Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president launched Bitcoin City, a city where geothermal energy at the base of a volcano would be harnessed for Bitcoin mining. Still, though, according to a study by The Advisor Coach, the two meme cryptocurrencies, Dogecoin ($DOGE) and Shiba Inu ($SHIB), not Bitcoin or Ethereum, are the most searched tokens in 30 U.S. states. Shiba, which has returned over 14,000,000% since it hit the market last year, is the most popular token in seven states that include California and Nevada. DOGE is currently trading at $0.2206 while SHIB presently has a unit price of $0.00004333. On Sunday, November 21, Crypto.com ($CRO) also surged by more than 25% to set a new ATH (All-Time High) of $0.7439.

Avalanche ($$AVAX), Polygon (MATIC), Elrond ($EGLD), and Decentraland ($MANA) are top coins to watch for the coming month. Avalanche, especially, soared by over 120% in the month and is already 4042% up YTD. According to experts’ projections, it would do even more.

Tesla Shares Hit All Time High!

The month of November saw the tech visionary, Elon Musk, further consolidating his drive to transform transport in space and Earth. SpaceX, his aerospace design and manufacturing company founded in 2002, first rose to international attention when it became the first private company to ship cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) in 2012. SpaceX was started out of his belief that the only factor holding humans back from becoming an interplanetary species was the high cost of human spaceflight. Despite the success of SpaceX so far, Elon’s most successful business pursuit so far is Tesla which has a market capitalization of $1.141 trillion.

On October 25, Bloomberg reported that the rental firm, Hertz, had ordered 100,000 of Tesla’s cars to be delivered over the next 14 months. The deal, the largest one-time purchase of electric cars, enables customers to rent Tesla’s Model 3 at numerous locations in the U.S. and Europe. On the heels of the news, Tesla recorded its biggest stock gain in a single day in a while, its new record high, climbing to $1,024.86. The purchase is expected to fetch the electric automaker about $4.2 billion in revenue. On November 20, the Financial Times reported that not only are competitors struggling to come close to Tesla on electric vehicle technology, but also on production too.

Over the past two weeks, Elon Musk has sold nearly $9 billion worth of Tesla stock after he asked his Twitter followers if he should sell 10% off his stake. Owing to the sales, Tesla’s stock has dropped by 7%, with about $84 billion eroded from its market cap.

Recent and Upcoming IPOs

2021 has been a year of IPOs, in sharp contrast to 2020 when the IPO market nosedived. Stripe, Rivian Automotive, InstaCart, Databricks, Discord, Impossible Foods, Better.com, NextDoor, Allbirds, Rent the Runway, Warby Parker, Robinhood, Couchbase, Sofi, UiPath, Coinbase, Coursera, Roblox, Bumble, and Affirm have been the most anticipated IPOs of the year. Of these, the financial technology firm, Affirm, was the first to go, debuting on the Nasdaq on January 13. Then in February and March, Bumble and Roblox respectively followed. Rivian shocked the investment world by becoming the most valuable automaker without any discernible income. The company has now overtaken the established Daimler, Ford, and General Motors in market cap.

Stripe, valued at at least $100 billion, is still deliberating on how it will go public: whether through an IPO or a direct listing. InstaCart, Databricks, Better.com, NextDoor, Allbirds, and Rent the Runway are scheduled for IPO towards the end of the year. For Discord and Impossible Foods, on the other hand, look forward to 2022.

Volatile Energy Markets: OPEC

On Monday, July 5, oil prices surged to a six-year high because of the decision of OPEC and its partners to start injecting 400,000 barrels a day to the market from August. However, a sticking point between Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates could not allow the agreement to go through. As a result, prices substantially receded for a while. That suggests that at least, for the meantime, producers are not willing to boost supply beyond the targeted daily increase despite the steadily increasing global energy demands since the gradual easing of COVID restrictions.

Notably, the benchmark crude oil contracts, Brent North Sea and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) futures, have undergone massive rallies since their last year multi-year lows. The post-COVID economic rebound has been mostly responsible for that. In fact, both the Brent North Sea and West Texas Intermediate (WTI) have almost doubled in price.

Climate Change Risks on Investment Funds

Human activities — from the dumping of plastic wastes into the sea to the burning of fossil fuels — are changing the climate. These activities generate tons of greenhouse emissions that are stabilizing the temperature of our planet. In August, just three months before the Glasgow’s climate summit, the COP26, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released a report that signaled a “code red” alert for the planet’s future. At the COP26 which held from October 31st to November 12th, enhanced pledges to mitigate the climate change crisis were made by many governments of the world. Eventually, the 197 participating countries signed the Glasgow Climate Pact.

The climate crisis is a clarion call for investors to rethink their investing principles and for already-ethical ones to deepen their commitment. That is, it can herald “socially responsible investors” who use ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) to evaluate their sustainability and ethical practices. Pool Corporation POOL, Cadence Design Systems, Inc. CDNS, West Pharmaceutical Sciences, Inc. WST, and iRobot Corporation IRBT, are some of the top ESG-friendly stocks to watch and buy before the end of the year.

Social Media Shares Movement: Meta, Snapchat, Twitter, and so on

On October 28, Facebook founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, announced the rebranding of the company to Meta(verse) Platforms, Inc. at Facebook Connect. Metaverse became the parent company to the Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and WhatsApp brands. The metaverse seeks to combine multiple forms of technology such as virtual reality, augmented reality, and video to create different worlds within a digital universe.

Nvidia NVDA, the producer of Graphics Processing Units (GPU), is the clear leader in the GPU market. The stock has generated over 8000% gain in the past decade. It is still expected to power the Metaverse and, in the process, generate more — with analysts believing that it will add another $10 billion over the next five years. Roblox RBLX, via the online entertainment platform which enables users to explore, build, and play, is also expected to fill important roles within the Metaverse sphere.

Hence, in addition to the meta platforms themselves, Nvidia and Roblox are two Metaverse stocks that can set you up for life. Look out for them.

Emerging Markets — China’s Crackdown on Digital Firms Impacting Shares

China is known for its authoritarian political grip. Well, it is also infamous for its tight hold on the economy. In September, the country sent a shockwave through the crypto world when it announced its blanket ban of crypto trading and mining. The People’s Bank of China, in partnership with securities and foreign exchange regulators, declared, in explicit terms, the banning of all cryptocurrency-related activities. This was also like the policies the country echoed in 2013 and 2017.

After the announcement, the prices of Bitcoin and altcoins dropped. In fact, on September 24, Bitcoin recorded one of its greatest plunges — a 30% decline in a single day. Cryptocurrency miners such as Riot Blockchain RIOT.O and Marathon Digital MARA.O, and exchanges such as OKEx and Huobi, as evident in the aftermath of the crackdown, often tend to be the most affected by those intermittent regulatory crackdowns. been cracking down on some other sectors such as tech. The most recent victims of this are the social ride-sharing app, Didi DIDI and the e-commerce giant, Alibaba BABA.

Besides companies in the cryptocurrency industry, Beijing has also been cracking down on some other sectors such as tech. The most recent victims of this are the social ride-sharing app, Didi DIDI and the e-commerce giant, Alibaba BABA.

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