Coinbase Shares Rally 16% After Q4 Results Miss Wall Street Expectations

Coinbase shares rallied 16% after the company published Q4 results that missed Wall Street expectations, with revenue at $1.8 billion, down 22% from the prior year.

“Coinbase does not fear competition from Wall Street, says exchange executive A Coinbase executive called on regulators to implement sensible crypto regulation, while announcing the Stand With Crypto event taking place in over 500 locations worldwide”

@coindesk

The quarter’s EBITDA fell 56% year over year to 566 million dollars as trading activity slowed on crypto markets, but investors focused on cash-flow strength.

@coindesk

Coinbase generated 3.1 billion dollars of free cash flow, a reversal from the prior quarter’s negative free cash flow, driven by improved working capital and reduced capital expenditures.

Despite the cash-flow turnaround, Coinbase reported a net loss of 667 million dollars versus a profit of 1.3 billion dollars a year earlier, and its adjusted EPS was -2.49.

The stock’s move came alongside a broader rise in crypto-linked equities and a focus on Coinbase’s liquidity, with the company ending the year with 11.6 billion dollars of cash and short-term investments.

A report cited by CoinDesk said JPMorgan Chase plans to offer cryptocurrency trading to institutional clients, a move analysts said could reshape competition without necessarily hurting rivals like Coinbase, Bullish, and Galaxy Digital.

ClearStreet analyst Owen Lau said, “If JPMorgan Chase propose du trading de cryptomonnaies à des clients institutionnels, cela aura un impact positif significatif sur le domaine.”

DiarioBitcoin

CoinDesk also quoted Ed Engel of Compass Point saying Wall Street’s involvement “widens the addressable market for digital assets” while intensifying competition.

Engel wrote that “COIN and Circle Financial (CRC) face risks of margin pressure,” while also arguing that rising institutional activity should lift spot and derivatives volumes and increase demand for lending and custody services.

The same CoinDesk coverage framed the JPMorgan initiative as a potential channel for institutional order aggregation and matching, pointing to platforms like Coinbase Prime and Bullish for settling trades.

CoinDesk reported Coinbase’s head of Policy for Europe, Katie Harries, said the exchange is “not at all” concerned about growing competition from financial institutions, arguing that crypto’s grassroots support cannot be replicated by Wall Street.

“Coinbase's chief executive, Brian Armstrong, expressed his enthusiasm at the New York Stock Exchange's recent announcement about the launch of a platform for tokenized stocks”

DiarioBitcoin

Harries told CoinDesk that “Stand With Crypto has over 3.7 million advocates across six markets,” and said members have contacted lawmakers more than 2.5 million times.

In the same CoinDesk account, Harries called for regulators worldwide to adopt “sensible crypto frameworks,” saying “The window to shape sensible crypto regulation is open.”

TradingView reported that Coinbase CEO and JPMorgan CEO discussed a market-structure bill in Davos, with the Coinbase policy chief Faryar Shirzad saying, “The fight for rewards is really an anomaly in our relationship with banks.”

TradingView also said the Senate Banking Committee expected a markup session for its version of the market-structure bill on January 15 but postponed it indefinitely after Armstrong said Coinbase could not support the legislation “as drafted.”