Coinbase Stock Price Forecast - COIN at $244: Is This 15x EBITDA Crypto–Stock Hybrid a Buy?

NASDAQ:COIN – High-Beta “Everything Exchange” Repriced Around $244

NASDAQ:COIN Snapshot – Price, Valuation, Earnings Power

NASDAQ:COIN trades near $244.35 per share with a market capitalization of roughly $65.5B, a trailing P/E of about 21x, and a 52-week range between $142.58 and $444.65. The stock sits in the middle of that range, after a drawdown of roughly 20% from 2025 highs that tracked the pullback in crypto, especially Bitcoin’s fall from around $123,000 back under $100,000.
In Q3 2025, Coinbase delivered $1.79B in revenue, up approximately 58.9% year-on-year, with net income of about $432.6M and a net margin above 24%. EBITDA was roughly $502.9M. The balance sheet carries around $9.77B of cash and short-term investments, $31.35B in total assets, $15.33B in total liabilities, and $16.02B in equity. At these levels, NASDAQ:COIN is a cash-rich, capital-light trading and infrastructure business priced at about 15–16x forward EBITDA.

Core Engine Of NASDAQ:COIN – Crypto Trading Still Dominates

Transaction revenue still contributes around 60% of total top line and remains heavily tied to crypto activity. The trading mix is concentrated: Bitcoin and Ethereum account for nearly half of all dollar trading volume on the platform. When BTC surged toward $123K before October 2025 and later slipped below $100K, trading volumes and transaction income followed the same boom-bust path.
That cyclicality is the central risk in NASDAQ:COIN today. The equity behaves like a leveraged play on crypto volatility. Strong quarters appear when markets trend and leverage expands; the revenue run-rate compresses as soon as volumes normalize or traders de-risk. The business remains fundamentally profitable at scale, but earnings power fluctuates heavily with risk appetite across BTC, ETH and the broader alt universe.

Deribit And Derivatives – Expanding Into The 80% Of Crypto Volume

To reduce reliance on spot flows, Coinbase executed the Deribit acquisition at roughly $4.3B, with around $3.6B paid in stock and the rest in cash. Fully diluted share count moves toward ~292M, up from the high-260M zone, which investors must track as an ongoing dilution cost.
Strategically, the logic is straightforward. Crypto derivatives represent about 80% of global crypto trading volumes. Owning Deribit gives NASDAQ:COIN a dominant presence in futures and options, where per-contract economics and engagement per user can be higher than in spot. If management integrates Deribit cleanly into the “everything exchange” strategy and captures a larger share of perpetual and options flow, Coinbase’s revenue mix should lean toward higher-margin, higher-stickiness derivatives rather than purely episodic spot spikes.

USDC And Subscriptions – The Recurring Cash Machine Under NASDAQ:COIN

The most important structural driver behind NASDAQ:COIN is the USDC stablecoin and subscription stack. USDC market cap has expanded from roughly $45B to around $75B in a year despite volatility in crypto prices. That growth fed a record $354M quarterly revenue from stablecoin and associated subscription products, making it one of the most consistent lines in the P&L.
On the cash flow statement, the USDC build shows up as a $2.5B negative swing in operating assets and liabilities, which explains why reported operating cash flow for the first nine months of 2025 was around -$784.5M. Adjusting for that working capital effect, underlying operating cash flow for the period is about $1.8B, annualizing to roughly $2.4B. With minimal traditional capex, that puts adjusted free cash flow near $2B, or around $6.85 per share on a fully diluted basis.
The GENIUS Act, which provides a regulated framework for stablecoins in the U.S., de-risks this income stream. It increases institutional comfort in holding USDC as a settlement and treasury tool, which directly supports Coinbase’s recurring yield and fee economics tied to the USDC float.

Equity Trading – 24/5 Zero-Commission Stocks As Growth And Diversification

Coinbase’s launch of 24/5 zero-commission stock trading for U.S. users is a direct challenge to Robinhood’s core franchise and expands the addressable market far beyond crypto. Robinhood’s own monthly data show equity trading volumes near $202B versus $29B in crypto, roughly 7x larger, highlighting how large the stock market opportunity is versus pure digital assets.
Even if NASDAQ:COIN captures only a modest fraction of those kinds of equity volumes over time, it creates a second major transactional revenue pillar that is less tethered to BTC cycles. Equity trading also improves user retention: a trader who handles both crypto and stocks on Coinbase is less likely to exit the ecosystem entirely when one asset class goes quiet.

USDC-Funded Stock Purchases – Flywheel Between Trading And Float

A crucial design choice is letting users fund stock purchases directly with USDC balances. That connects the trading engine and the balance sheet more tightly. Customers who trade equities through USDC are incentivized to hold larger stablecoin balances on-platform, often under subscription products like Coinbase One to maximize yield.
For NASDAQ:COIN, that means higher and more stable USDC balances, which translate into larger interest income streams and share of the stablecoin yield pool. As the Fed cuts rates through 2026, the yield per dollar may fall, but total float can still rise if product adoption and use cases expand. The equity trading rollout therefore acts as a compensating mechanism against lower short-term rates.

Prediction Markets And Credit – Optionality On New Revenue Verticals

Beyond spot, derivatives, and stocks, Coinbase is building prediction markets, allowing users to trade outcomes on sporting events and other real-world events. The space is early, but spreads are wide, engagement is high for active traders, and the product fits naturally into the existing trading infrastructure. If it scales, prediction markets add another niche, high-margin vertical that keeps heavy users inside the NASDAQ:COIN ecosystem instead of pushing them to specialist platforms.
In parallel, Coinbase is using its balance sheet to build out credit lines within the sector, such as a $200M crypto-backed facility for a mining company. With $8.7B+ cash, around $15.3B in liabilities, and a capital-light core business, carefully underwritten, collateralized lending can compound yield without meaningfully increasing insolvency risk. This credit capability is another tool to monetize COIN’s scale and relationships.

Balance Sheet Strength And Leverage – NASDAQ:COIN Not A Solvency Story

The Q3 2025 balance sheet shows $9.77B in cash and short-term investments, $31.35B in total assets, $15.33B in total liabilities, and $16.02B in equity. Debt stands around $7.3B, more than covered by cash. The business model does not require heavy physical capex, and growth is driven by software, platform improvements and M&A rather than plant and equipment.
This means the main risk in NASDAQ:COIN is not solvency but earnings volatility. As long as management avoids reckless leverage or mispriced credit, the balance sheet can absorb cyclical downturns in trading and crypto sentiment without threatening the franchise. The focus for investors should be on the sustainability of free cash flow and the path of margins, not on short-term liquidity shocks.

Dilution And Stock-Based Compensation – The Silent Drag On Per-Share Growth

Stock-based compensation remains significant, above $600M in the first nine months of 2025, and the Deribit deal added ~$3.6B in new NASDAQ:COIN shares. Fully diluted share count is now around 292M.
At current valuations, each incremental dollar of stock-based compensation and stock-funded M&A has a real impact on per-share economics. Even with a core FCF base near $2B, aggressive equity issuance can shave 2–3 percentage points off annual per-share growth. For an equity priced at ~15.5x forward EBITDA and ~4x book, that dilution must be watched closely through insider and equity structure data, which can be tracked via the COIN stock profile and insider transactions pages.

Macro, Rates And Regulation – How The Environment Hits NASDAQ:COIN

Macro and policy remain double-edged. On the positive side, the GENIUS Act and broader regulatory clarity around stablecoins reduce existential risk for NASDAQ:COIN and encourage institutional adoption of USDC. On the negative side, the Fed’s rate cuts since September 2025 compress the yield that Coinbase can earn on the USDC float, even as balances rise.
BTC’s move from $123K to below $100K has already shown how sensitive transaction revenue is to price and volatility. If Bitcoin spends a long stretch in a sideways band around, for example, $80K–$100K, volumes could remain subdued even without a crash, forcing the equity and derivatives expansions to carry more of the growth. At the same time, political pressure on the Federal Reserve and concerns about U.S. monetary credibility help the long-term case for crypto adoption, indirectly supporting the strategic logic behind NASDAQ:COIN.

Valuation, Intrinsic Value And Clear Rating For NASDAQ:COIN

At about $244 per share, NASDAQ:COIN sits at a market cap near $65–66B and an enterprise value around $58.7B once $13.5B+ in cash and USDC and $2.6B of long-term crypto holdings are netted against $7.2B of debt.
Consensus revenue for FY26 is roughly $8.4B, implying ~15% growth versus the current ~59% run-rate, already building in a meaningful slowdown. Assuming a stable 45% adjusted EBITDA margin, FY26 EBITDA comes out around $3.78B, making the stock trade at about 15.5x EV / FY26 EBITDA. On a free cash flow basis, with ~$2B adjusted FCF today and roughly $6.85 FCF per share, conservative DCF scenarios at a 10% discount rate produce fair value ranges around $249 at 15% long-term CAGR and $359 if 20% CAGR is sustained. Earlier work pegged fair value near $366, broadly consistent with the upper band.
Set against that range, the current quote around $240–$250 is close to the low end of reasonable intrinsic value if Coinbase grows modestly and is clearly undervalued if the “everything exchange” strategy delivers sustained mid-teens or better FCF growth.

Final Stance On NASDAQ:COIN – High-Risk, But A Buy At ~$244

Taking the full picture together—volatile but powerful transaction revenue tied to BTC and ETH, a rapidly scaling and legally supported USDC franchise, expansion into equities and prediction markets, accretive derivatives exposure via Deribit, a strong balance sheet, but real dilution and macro risks—the equity still offers an attractive skew for long-horizon investors comfortable with volatility.
At around $244 with an EV / EBITDA multiple in the mid-teens, a P/E near 21x, and a credible path to compound free cash flow from roughly $2B today, NASDAQ:COIN justifies a Buy stance. The stock remains a high-beta vehicle, but the combination of USDC scale, equity trading, derivatives and regulated stablecoin economics supports a constructive view as long as investors are prepared to live with sharp drawdowns when crypto sentiment turns.

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