Article Author: Lean View

Recently, the Nasdaq-listed company Nano Labs (Nasdaq: NA) announced a private placement plan, raising a total of $36.25 million, with participants including Fenbushi Inc - US, Longling Capital, and Golden Forest Management Limited.

Nano Labs, founded by Mr. Kong Jianping, who serves as co-chairman of the board and was formerly with Canaan Creative, went public on Nasdaq in July 2022. Under Kong's leadership, Canaan Creative successfully listed as the first company in the global blockchain industry, pioneering the entry of blockchain companies into the traditional securities market. Kong Jianping has been involved in the Bitcoin industry since 2012 and has over a decade of deep experience. The second-largest shareholder of Nano Labs is another legendary figure in the crypto space, "Forest Man" — Sun Qifeng, the founder of the world's first Bitcoin magazine "1BTC," which included Bitcoin with every purchase of the magazine.

A significant highlight of this private placement is the substantial participation of several patriarchs of the crypto industry, indicating a potential strategic involvement in the future development of Nano Labs rather than just a simple financial investment. Additionally, HashKey Group, which has already invested in Nano Labs during the Pre-IPO round, and the family office fund of former Huobi founder Li Lin are also involved. It can be said that after this round of financing, Nano Labs has gathered a group of top giants from the native Chinese crypto circle, forming a "Chinese crypto dream team." The Chinese community holds a relatively advantageous and influential position in the crypto industry, from computing power share to BTC holdings, and from ecological layout to application development.

This private placement introduces a significant proportion of new equity, and the strategic shareholders brought in have deep industry knowledge and top-tier resources, which can be expected to lead to a major strategic transformation and upgrade for Nano Labs in the future.

Since last year, the company's chairman, Kong Jianping, has been active in the Bitcoin ecosystem, supporting the development of important Bitcoin infrastructure globally through investments in Satoshi Labs and BTC liquidity protocols, and participating in and organizing several influential industry summits. He has accumulated significant influence and prestige within the Bitcoin ecosystem. Following this private placement, Nano is expected to undergo a comprehensive strategic transformation, focusing on BTC as its core business, purchasing, holding, and managing BTC, and participating in BTC ecosystem development and liquidity support.

Although many listed companies have announced plans to purchase Bitcoin as a reserve asset this year, most of these companies are primarily focused on financial investment or riding the BTC concept wave. There are very few companies that genuinely understand BTC and the crypto industry as their main operational direction. The most typical example in the U.S. stock market is Microstrategy, which has made BTC its primary business focus. Since the beginning of this bull market, its stock price has surged from around $30 to a peak of $543, an increase of over 15 times, with a market cap exceeding $100 billion, currently valued at over $80 billion.

Microstrategy has innovated its investment and financing model to hold a large amount of Bitcoin. Since August 2020, Microstrategy has invested idle funds into Bitcoin, becoming the first publicly traded company to implement a Bitcoin funding strategy. It has continued to buy Bitcoin, and as of December 1, 2024, it and its subsidiaries hold approximately 402,100 Bitcoins, with a total purchase cost of about $23.4 billion, making it a significant holder of Bitcoin and influencing the market supply and demand and price direction to some extent.

Microstrategy has financed its Bitcoin purchases through convertible bonds, which are mostly medium to long-term zero-coupon bonds, with the option to convert to stock or repay in cash at Microstrategy's discretion, reducing financing costs and debt default risks. This has closely linked stock and Bitcoin price fluctuations, achieving triple arbitrage in stocks, bonds, and cryptocurrencies, providing a new source of funding and operational model for Bitcoin investment.

Similar to Microstrategy, Nano Labs will also focus on BTC as its primary business direction in the future. Given the strong background and deep industry knowledge of its shareholders in the native crypto field, it is even possible to expect Nano Labs to have more groundbreaking layouts and strategies in the BTC ecosystem. Kong Jianping, as an industry OG, has been a staunch believer in BTC since entering the crypto industry in 2012 and is a well-known predictor of Bitcoin prices, with a profound understanding of industry development. Ten years ago, he expressed in an interview that Bitcoin would break through $100,000 and advised not to sell Bitcoin within ten years when its price was still hovering around $50. During the Bitcoin bear market in 2019, at the Bitcoin Mining Conference, he reiterated that Bitcoin would break through $100,000, stating, "The only obstacle to Bitcoin breaking $100,000 is time," a widely influential viewpoint at that time when Bitcoin was below $5,000. The distributed capital founded by Shen Bo and Wanxiang is one of the two major early investment and incubation institutions for the current second-largest cryptocurrency, ETH. As one of the oldest investment institutions in the crypto industry, they have invested in numerous leading public chains and projects, and HashKey Group has also obtained the first compliant exchange license in Hong Kong. One of the leaders in China's mobile internet, Longling Capital's founder and Meitu Group's chairman Cai Wensheng, is also an early participant in cryptocurrencies and a believer in Bitcoin. It is rumored that influential figures and institutions in the crypto industry, such as Kevin Ren's CGV Capital, Waterdrip Capital's founder Jademont, MetaEra's founder Vito, and K24 Ventures' founder Patrick, also participated in this private placement.

In terms of macro direction and the ability to break through, Kong Jianping has generally been able to make accurate judgments and even participate in driving changes and breakthroughs in the industry landscape. Not only does he have long-term predictive capabilities regarding Bitcoin prices and led Canaan Creative to successfully become the first global blockchain stock, but he also played a very important role in the "New Crypto Policy" released in Hong Kong in October 2022, proposing numerous targeted policy suggestions across various fields and acting as a communicator and educator. Now, as an industry representative, Kong Jianping has been appointed by the Hong Kong SAR government as a director of the Hong Kong Cyberport (an important platform for developing Web3 and crypto finance) and a member of the Hong Kong government's third-generation internet group, playing a significant role in promoting Hong Kong as a crypto finance center in the Far East. The impactful private placement and the significant adjustment of Nano Labs' business direction are likely the beginning of Kong Jianping's new strategic layout.

After this private placement is completed, based on the latest closing price, Nano's market value is still less than $200 million, which is severely undervalued compared to Microstrategy's current market value of over $80 billion. Once Nano officially starts its BTC-centric business direction, the "crypto dream team" led by Kong Jianping is likely to make significant moves from multiple angles and fields, potentially becoming one of the most important purchasing forces for BTC spot, succeeding Microstrategy. Conversely, Nano will also become one of the biggest beneficiaries of this bull market. Due to the major shareholders' deep layout in the Bitcoin ecosystem, Nano is likely to have advantages in asset management and native Bitcoin ecosystem strategies that other listed companies, including Microstrategy, cannot match, including obtaining high-risk-free returns on BTC through building multi-layer infrastructure liquidity systems, etc. This requires a profound understanding and knowledge of BTC itself, as well as deep understanding, participation, and extensive industry resources to realize various infrastructures. This gives Nano the opportunity to become a unique target with barriers in the capital market, and it is not excluded that it may surpass Microstrategy to become a leading listed company focused on Bitcoin.

On December 5, BTC broke through $100,000, and Nano Labs chairman Kong Jianping tweeted:

"In 2019, I expressed a viewpoint at the New Era Mining Summit: the only obstacle to Bitcoin breaking $100,000 is time. At that time, Bitcoin was hovering around a few thousand dollars, and many people did not believe this would happen. Just now, on December 5, 2024, Bitcoin broke $100,000. The only obstacle to Bitcoin breaking $1 million in the future is still time!"

Now, with Trump, known as the "crypto president," winning the U.S. election, the U.S., as the leading economy in technology, finance, and economics, is fully turning crypto-friendly. Before this, in early 2024, a large number of BTC ETFs had already been approved for issuance. Following Trump's victory, the U.S. federal government and the Federal Reserve's plans to hold Bitcoin have been put on the agenda, and some state governments and state federal reserves have already passed bills and are about to implement reserve plans. Once these plans begin to be implemented, they will have a significant leading demonstration effect globally, and many related countries and emerging nations may follow suit. Coupled with the continuous investment from listed companies and asset management giants holding substantial capital, the limited total supply of BTC is expected to experience a massive explosion of consensus buying power globally.

Perhaps, as Kong Jianping said, everything is just beginning. Bitcoin breaking $1 million is only a matter of time, and Nano, as the flagship under his leadership, is about to set sail in the great maritime era of BTC with the support of many "crypto dream team" leaders.