Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange that deals in actual US dollars, has published its earnings for the first quarter of 2024 — when the bitcoin p

Coinbase Q1 2024 earnings: number go up, with a bit of juicing

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2024-05-12 23:30:05

Coinbase, the largest crypto exchange that deals in actual US dollars, has published its earnings for the first quarter of 2024 — when the bitcoin price reached its previous peak again. [Shareholder letter, PDF; Earnings call webcast; Earnings call transcript, PDF; Analyst call transcript, PDF; 10-Q]

The numbers look great! “We generated $1.6 billion of total revenue and $1.2 billion of net income. Adjusted EBITDA was $1.0 billion – more than we generated in all of 2023,” said CEO Brian Armstrong in the earnings call on May 2.

Those numbers are better than Q4 2023 — the first quarter Coinbase reported a profit in eight quarters. In that quarter, Coinbase reported $954 million in total revenue and $273 million net income.

But this quarter’s numbers are up because Coinbase holds crypto as an investment — and when the bitcoin price went from $42,000 to $71,000 in the first three months of the year, Coinbase claimed considerable one-time paper gains.