Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong has said that the company is building to dominate the finance industry and not just crypto. He mentioned it during the company’s last earning call where he tof analysts that within the next five years, he wants Coinbase to be the number one financial service app on the planet.
Brian said he’s not looking at what traditional finance has been. “We want to look forwards and skate to where this opportunity is going,” he said. He made it clear that Coinbase is still mainly focused on trading and payments, but that’s just the start. “Crypto is eating financial services,” he said. Brian believes asset classes like money market funds, securities, real estate, and debt are all moving on-chain. And he sees Coinbase as the platform that will power that change.
Coinbase wants banks to become its future clients
Coinbase presently serves both regular people and big players. On top of its core exchange, it has rolled out services like stablecoin payments, staking, and institutional custody. Brian said more than 200 major institutions use these features, including BlackRock, Stripe, and PayPal.
The timing is no accident. Over the past two months, US regulators have started to ease up on crypto. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency just gave the green light for banks it oversees to offer crypto services. That decision comes right after the Federal Reserve and the FDIC made similar moves, reversing warnings they gave out last year. With President Donald Trump back in the White House and regulatory pressure easing, Brian said old institutions are now racing to figure out how to plug into the space.
In February, Brian Moynihan, CEO of Bank of America, said the bank could issue a stablecoin if regulation allows it. Brian said it’s only a matter of time. “We think that every major bank is going to be integrating crypto at some point,” he said. He explained that Coinbase can be the engine behind that. “For some of them, it’s a custodial solution. Others are interested in having a stablecoin solution.”
He added that some banks want to make their stablecoins, but he thinks that’s a bad idea. “Our view is that that’s not necessarily the best path because stablecoins have network effects,” Brian said. He added that for a stablecoin to work, it needs to be usable across multiple institutions. That’s not possible if every bank tries to create its version.
Stablecoins are now Coinbase’s second-biggest source of income after trading. In the first quarter of this year, stablecoin-related revenue went up 50% compared to the same time last year. From the last quarter alone, it increased by 32%. The growth came mainly from USDC, which Coinbase helped create. The company has a 50% revenue-sharing deal with Circle, the stablecoin’s issuer, and takes all the interest from USDC products on its platform.