Coinbase is the largest crypto exchange and custodian in the U.S., offering retail consumers, institutional clients, and developers a platform to trade, hold, and build with crypto assets. Retail users can trade crypto, stocks, derivatives, and prediction markets through a single app. Institutional clients are served through Coinbase Prime, a full-service prime brokerage offering trading, custody, and financing. Developers and businesses can access Coinbase's Developer Platform (CDP), which offers custody, trading, wallets, and payment functionality as infrastructure-as-a-service. Revenue falls into two categories: transaction revenue from trading fees, and subscription and services revenue, which includes stablecoin reserve income-sharing from USDC (under a partnership with Circle), staking commissions, custody fees, and Coinbase One subscriptions. Transaction revenue is highly correlated with crypto market activity, while subscription and services revenue is more durable. Coinbase's strategy centers on three pillars: expanding into an "everything exchange" for all asset classes on crypto rails (accelerated by its acquisition of Deribit, the leading crypto options platform), building a full-stack payments business around stablecoins and USDC, and growing its developer infrastructure through CDP and Base, its Layer 2 blockchain. Coinbase holds 12% of all crypto in the world in custody, including for the majority of crypto ETF issuers.
Read full business overview →Mid to long-term bullish thesis
View →Mid to long-term bearish thesis
View →Mid to long-term bull-bear debate
View → NEWSummary and scoring of the bull-bear debate
View →Find ideas with similar bull or bear theses
View →Investor-relevant company attributes
View →Key risks to the business
View →Comparisons of annual risk disclosures
View →