Novogratz goes 'Tubthumping' with Chumbawamba, says crypto can't stay knocked down

Galaxy Digital CEO Mike Novogratz used an earnings call on Tuesday to take listeners "Tubthumping" on a blast to the past, referencing a chart-topper from the late 1990s.

"There was a Chumbawamba song in the late '90s. 'I get knocked down, but I get up again.' And that really is, I think, the ethos of crypto," Novogratz said on the call for the second quarter of the year.

"This was a revolution started by people who didn't believe fully in centralized systems and aren't going to be pushed away easily," he added. "And so I think what heartens me in the last year, because it's been a tough year, is just seeing that resilience, seeing it with our employees, seeing with our customers and broadly seeing it with the crypto community."

Galaxy Digital saw a 54% decrease in trading revenue in the second quarter, down to $59.5 million. There was a bright spot, though, with the firm reducing its net loss for the period to $46 million from $554.7 million in the same quarter last year.

Novogratz pointed to recent developments in the industry he said were evidence that recent headwinds were starting to fade.

Crypto headwinds fading

"I jokingly said I went to bed every night and said prayers asking for 4 things, right, that the Fed will be closer to heading their tightening cycle and starting an easing cycle. And that an ETF would be approved, that Ripple would win its case and that finance would settle with regulators," he said. "And 3 of those 4 dreams or wish list items, we've made great progress, right?"

Novogratz said that Galaxy would "fight like cats and dogs" for market share, should a spot bitcoin ETF be approved.

It wasn't all roses, though, as the executive lamented the difficulty of getting Galaxy onto the Nasdaq stock exchange, saying the past 24 months have been "unbelievably frustrating" and "un-American at its core." He also warned that continuing regulatory uncertainty in the U.S. could hurt the county's competiveness and push out jobs. 

"We are building a global business. And we're going to go — we're going to move our resources where opportunity present themselves," he said.