In its latest Q4 2025 shareholder letter , Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong outlined three key priorities for 2026, painting a blueprint for the next steps of the largest compliant exchange in the United States.
Universal Exchange: One-stop solution for crypto, stocks, and prediction markets.
The first strategic priority is to establish Coinbase as the "only trusted platform" for customers to trade all types of assets. This not only covers existing cryptocurrency spot and futures trading, but also extends to stocks, commodities, and prediction markets.
In fact, Coinbase launched commission-free stock trading for US users as early as December 2025 and partnered with compliant prediction market platform Kalshi to launch prediction market functionality. Armstrong emphasized in his letter that the goal is to allow users to manage more portfolios on a single platform, thereby increasing user engagement and stickiness.
USDC Payment Leap Forward: Stablecoins Are More Than Just Transaction Tools
The second strategy is to accelerate the usability of USDC and the development of its payment technology stack, including APIs, wallets, and merchant channels, to make value transfer faster, cheaper, and more convenient.
Data shows that USDC, jointly issued by Coinbase and Circle, generated $332.5 million in revenue in the second quarter of 2025, while the on-chain payment volume of stablecoins reached $9 trillion that year, a surge of 87% compared to the previous year. Coinbase has now launched the Coinbase Payments service, which, after integration with Shopify, allows merchants to receive payments directly in USDC, achieving near-instantaneous cross-border settlements on the Base chain with fees below $0.01.
Industry analysts predict that the total circulating market capitalization of stablecoins will exceed $1 trillion in 2026, which is undoubtedly a huge opportunity for Coinbase, which owns the USDC ecosystem.
On-chain Base: Bringing the whole world onto the blockchain
The third strategy aims to "Bring the World Onchain." Coinbase plans to make the on-chain experience simpler and easier to use by expanding the DeFi integration capabilities of its app and increasing investment in the Base Chain application ecosystem.
Currently, the total value locked (TVL) in DeFi on the Base chain has reached $4.63 billion, accounting for 46% of the entire Layer 2 market, firmly holding the top spot in L2. Coinbase has also launched the "Base App," a super app that combines wallet, trading, payment, and social functions, and recently released "Agentic Wallets," designed specifically for AI agents, integrating the x402 payment protocol to enable AI agents to autonomously conduct on-chain transactions and micro-payments.
Ambitious, but also facing many challenges.
It's worth noting that Coinbase is entering 2026 with strong product development momentum, but the market environment is far from smooth. The company's net profit plummeted by 94% in the first quarter of 2025, and analysts have pointed out that COIN's stock price increase has deviated from fundamentals. Given the overall pressure on the crypto market, whether these three strategies can be implemented as scheduled and translate into actual revenue growth remains to be seen.
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