From Coinbase shareholder letter:

Coinbase delivered strong Q4 and full year 2024 results, with full year revenue of $6.6 billion, net income of $2.6 billion, and Adjusted EBITDA of $3.3 billion. Zooming out, the last few months have demonstrated a sea change in the regulatory environment, unlocking new opportunities for Coinbase and the crypto industry.

It’s the dawn of a new era for crypto. Crypto’s voice was heard loud and clear in the US elections, and the era of regulation via enforcement that crippled our industry in the US is on its way out. The Trump Administration is moving fast to fulfill its promise of making the US the crypto capital of the planet, and globally, leaders are taking notice and increasing their attention and investment into crypto.

That means it’s time to double down on what we’ve always focused on: building. Our goals in 2025 are to drive revenue, drive utility, and scale our foundations. Our ambition to drive revenue reflects our intention to grow trading market share in the markets where we operate, to accelerate USDC market cap growth, and to continue growing our subscription and services revenue—including staking, custody, Coinbase One, and more. Utility starts with making crypto payments work for consumers and businesses, and we plan to do that by making it easier for users to adopt and use stablecoins. At the same time you will see us working hard to bring more people onchain through products like our leading layer 2 platform Base, SmartWallet, and Coinbase Developer Platform.

Our Q4 and FY 2024 financial results are now live. pic.twitter.com/R5LuW7pwI9

— Coinbase 🛡️ (@coinbase) February 13, 2025

2024 was a strong year for crypto and for Coinbase – our revenue more than doubled to $6.6 billion, net income was $2.6 billion, and we generated $3.3 billion of Adjusted EBITDA. Q4 total revenue was $2.3 billion, up 88% Q/Q. Transaction revenue was $1.6 billion, up 172% Q/Q. Subscription and services revenue grew 15% Q/Q to $641 million, driven by higher crypto asset prices, average native unit inflows across staking, custody, and USDC assets in our product suite, as well as continued growth of Coinbase One subscribers. Total operating expenses were $1.2 billion, up 19% Q/Q, while technology & development, general & administrative, and sales & marketing expenses were collectively $957 million, up 10% Q/Q. Net income was $1.3 billion and included $476 million in pre-tax gains on our crypto asset investment portfolio—the vast majority of which were unrealized—as crypto prices were higher on December 31, 2024 as compared to September 30, 2024. Gains on our crypto asset investment portfolio were $357 million after reflecting the tax impact. Adjusted EBITDA was $1.3 billion. Our balance sheet strengthened, as we ended Q4 with $9.3 billion in $USD resources, up $1.1 billion Q/Q

2024 transaction revenue was $4.0 billion, up 162% Y/Y. Total Trading Volume3 was $1.2 trillion, up 148% Y/Y. Consumer Trading Volume was $221.0 billion, up 195% Y/Y, and Institutional Trading Volume was $941.2 billion, up 139% Y/Y. The majority of the Y/Y growth in Trading Volume was driven by higher levels of Crypto Asset Volatility4—particularly in Q1 and Q4—as well as higher average crypto asset prices (see chart below). The two primary factors underpinning these stronger macroeconomic factors were the launch of the Bitcoin ETF products in Q1’24, and the election of a pro-crypto President and Congress in Q4’24 and the associated expectation of regulatory clarity—both of which resulted in elevated spot crypto trading activity. Total crypto market cap grew to $3.4 trillion at the end of 2024, up 98% Y/Y compared to the end of 2023, average crypto market cap was 103% higher Y/Y compared to 2023, and Crypto Asset Volatility was up 37% compared to 2023. In addition, our share of the US spot market grew over the course of 2024, we expanded our “Day 1” listings efforts (i.e. when we’re the first centralized exchange to launch a token for trading & custody), and we added 48 new assets for spot trading.

Over the course of 2024, we successfully executed on growing our derivatives business. For example, we added 92 new assets for trading on our international exchange. While still early, both our consumer and institutional derivatives volume and market share reached all-time highs in Q4. As a reminder, the revenue contribution from these products is recorded in our consumer and institutional transaction revenues, respectively. However, our reported Trading Volume only includes matched spot volume on our exchange, and thus excludes derivatives volume.

Institutional Trading Volume was $345.0 billion, up 128% Q/Q, and outperformed the US spot market.Institutional transaction revenue in Q4 was $141 million, up 156% Q/Q. Performance in Q4 was strong across the board as we saw significant Q/Q revenue growth across our exchanges and Prime.

In addition to strong market conditions, we have significant momentum in our institutional business:

• Strong adoption of our Prime suite across custody, prime trading, financing, and staking, with top clients engaging with most of these products in 2024, and our onboarding pipeline remains robust.

• Flywheel in motion: Launched just over a year ago, Prime Financing saw all-time high loan balances in Q4, and we have seen elevated client trading activity among customers who use financing.

Additionally, while still early days, we continued to grow our institutional derivatives business in Q4—both in the US and through our international exchange, to deepen liquidity, list more assets, and improve capital efficiency —all of which put us in a better position going into 2025 to deliver growth.

Institutional. Our 2023 Institutional Adoption survey showed that 60% of financial institutions planned to increase their crypto allocations over the next three years, citing regulatory concerns as a primary blocker. Fast forward to 2025, and we are closer than ever to regulatory clarity in the US. Over the last few years we focused on building an all-in-one institutional platform, seamlessly integrating custody, staking, trading, and financing. Today, our investments are paying off as hedge funds, corporates, and registered investment advisors (“RIAs”) increasingly turn to Coinbase for secure, compliant, and comprehensive solutions.

Our institutional flywheel gained significant momentum in 2024, with ETFs driving record inflows and pushing our AUC from ETFs to $93.2 billion as of the end of Q4. Institutional participation continues to grow, with 7% of RIAs now investing in crypto ETFs—up 41% since Q1 of 2024—and a higher percentage of our top clients utilizing multiple services across Coinbase Prime. This flywheel effect—where increasing AUC attracts greater use of trading, staking, and financing—creates deeper client relationships and incremental revenue growth, positioning Coinbase as the go-to platform for institutions.

Read the full letter here.

Source: Coinbase