Wall Street trims Q2 earnings expectations

Barclays analyst Benjamin Budish estimates Coinbase processed roughly $152 billion of trading volume during the quarter, well below the Street’s expectation of about $178 billion. He expects adjusted EBITDA to come in roughly 3% below consensus, pointing to weaker blockchain rewards and institutional trading revenue.

Clear Street’s Owen Lau also lowered estimates, projecting approximately $160 billion in trading volume and $301 million in adjusted EBITDA after weaker-than-expected retail activity.

Benchmark’s Mark Palmer similarly reduced his EBITDA forecast to $377 million, while Compass Point expects revenue to slightly miss consensus but believes EBITDA will be roughly in line with expectations.

Coinbase still rises and falls with crypto trading activity, a dependency that has become more apparent over the past year. The company has spent heavily to diversify revenue through stablecoins, derivatives, payments, tokenization and its Base blockchain. Those businesses continue to grow, but they remain relatively small compared with transaction revenue.

Subscription stability

One area where analysts are more constructive is subscription and services revenue.

This segment includes interest income from USDC, staking rewards, custody fees, Coinbase One subscriptions and institutional services. Because those businesses are less tied to daily trading volumes, analysts expect them to provide a cushion against weaker transaction revenue.