JPMorgan speculated of “shorting the market”; Bank triples crypto team even as CEO asks for ban

• According to recent reports, JPMorgan has tripled its internal crypto team ahead of spot Bitcoin ETF approval.
• This comes a little over a week after JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon attacked crypto, saying he would shut it down if he were the government.
• Speculation suggests Dimon is attempting to short the market, a move used by JPMorgan at the time of Gold spot ETF.

Bitcoin has had many criticisms throughout its history, which have significantly decreased over the past couple of months. However, some, such as JPMorgan Chase's CEO, still stood by their opinion, at least in words. The bank's actions, on the other hand, suggest a completely different situation developing internally.

JPMorgan could be shorting Bitcoin

JPMorgan Chase, while never publicly been supportive of Bitcoin, seems to be taking an interest in the digital asset ahead of the potential spot BTC ETF approval set for January 2024. This opinion is reflected in the bank's recent personnel change wherein, according to reports, the internal crypto team has tripled.

Interestingly, these reports have come merely days after the bank's CEO, Jamie Dimon, made a rather bold statement about Bitcoin and crypto assets. At a US Senate hearing recently, Dimon told Senators that he has always been opposed to digital assets and that if he were the government, he would close it down.

This not only reflects conflict within the bank but also gives weight to the speculation of JPMorgan shorting the market. According to popular crypto investor Jason A. Williams, this was done by the bank during the launch of the spot Gold ETF as well.

However, while many supported this theory at face value, others did not consider it to be technically accurate. Another known trader, Magnelibra, replied to Williams' tweet, saying,

"The only difference is the real price is determined by how much supply there is if nobody wants to sell their BTC then they can create all the synthetic BTC shorts they want they are just exchanging fiat values. It's like the futures markets nothing more than trading the fiat price. Whereas if you buy BTC and store it, it's unavailable and you can't borrow it, you can't rehypothecate it. An ETF on bitcoin is nothing more than an added layer of counterparty risk, makes zero sense."

Thus, the truth of the matter may be simply that either JPMorgan is truly shorting the market or there is some difference of opinion among the CEO and other members of the bank. Regardless, neither of them seems to be having any effect on the market or Bitcoin price whatsoever.