U.S.-listed cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase (COIN) is introducing stock trading and incorporating prediction markets, along with a slew of other new products and assets that aims to cement the platform’s position as the “Everything Exchange,” the company announced during its System Update stream on Wednesday.
Coinbase said it is dramatically expanding the assets available to trade on its platform, including novel cryptocurrencies, perpetual futures, stocks and prediction markets, starting with Kalshi with more integrations to come later.
Offering users a Swiss Army knife trading platform has become a competitive field of late. Some of Coinbase’s main crypto trading rivals, such as Robinhood, Kraken and Gemini have launched tokenized equity offerings to users outside the U.S., and are also exploring prediction markets.
The main Coinbase app will provide “a simple interface to trade futures and perps, the ability to trade all Solana assets as soon as they’re created, primary token sales, the global launch of the Base App,” according to the blog.
The regulatory environment in the U.S. has evolved significantly in recent years to the point where the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has implicitly given the nod to the always-on trading of some tokenized stocks on blockchains.
Taking Stock
There isn’t a list of stocks that will be tradable at launch as it’s still subject to change, said Coinbase’s head of consumer and business products, Max Branzburg. It is, however, going to be hundreds of top stocks based on market cap, trading volume, and other metrics, with plans to add thousands of additional stocks and ETFs over the coming months, Branzburg said via email.
It’s an integration that simplifies portfolio management, allowing Coinbase users to buy, sell, and manage stocks and ETFs alongside crypto portfolios – with USD or USDC – all within one Coinbase app and account, the exchange said in its blog post.
“Traders will get zero-commission trading without the constraints of traditional market hours – trade your top stocks 24 hours a day, five days a week,” the post continued. “We plan to add thousands of additional stocks over the coming months.”
Early next year, the plan is to broaden stock perpetuals so traders outside the U.S. can get 24/7, capital efficient exposure to U.S. stocks via the app, Coinbase said.
The move is facilitated by Coinbase Tokenize, the firms’ new end-to-end institutional platform for tokenizing real-world assets, which will power retail access to tokenized stocks on the exchange.
Asked about the nuts and bolts of the tokenization process and the regulatory status of stock tokens and their custody as it relates to a Central Securities Depository (CSD), for example, Branzburg said via email:
“What we are really focused on is enabling RWA and tokenized assets. The mechanism for how we do that is in progress, and we’ll have more specific details to share soon. Our regulatory rigor puts us in a unique position to lead as the space matures, too.”
Prediction Markets, Perps, Solana DEX
Starting with the integration of $11 billion-valued prediction market provider Kalashi, Coinbase users will be able to trade on the outcomes of real-world events like elections, sports, collectibles, and economic indicators, with prices of the event contracts determined by the collective trading activity of market participants.
Coinbase also said it has simplified derivatives trading, allowing users to make bigger moves with less upfront capital, and take advantage of more favorable tax benefits when trading across crypto markets and commodities.
“We have more than 30 futures and perps contracts live in the US across asset classes from crypto to commodities to equity indices, with plans to expand to hundreds more contracts over time,” Branzburg said via email. “As of this week, we now offer 15 perpetual-style futures contracts for cryptocurrencies including BTC, ETH, SOL, XRP and the following listed here”.
Rolling out over the coming weeks, Coinbase said it is expanding its decentralized exchange (DEX) trading integration to include access to Solana tokens. The main exchange app is integrating popular Solana DEX aggregator Jupiter, so users can swap tokens securely without ever leaving the app.
Coinbase Business and Wealth Management
In addition, Coinbase Business, a financial platform designed for startups and small businesses working with crypto, becomes available to all eligible businesses in the U.S. and Singapore, the exchange posted.
“We are empowering users to send and receive payments globally with payment links and invoices, manage crypto assets via Coinbase Advanced, and automate financial workflows with access to Coinbase’s regulated infrastructure,” said a blogpost.
The exchange is also pushing a new AI-based wealth management tool called Coinbase Advisor, which the exchange said bridges the gap between idea and execution. High-quality financial guidance isn’t a luxury product, but a standard for everyone, Coinbase said.
“Instead of manually piecing together trades, users can simply tell the AI their goals and questions – ‘Build me a portfolio,’ ‘What’s the latest market news and how does it impact me?’ – and get a personalized answer with recommendations powered by the products, data, and tools available on Coinbase,” the post added.
Coinbase’s popular Ethereum overlay blockchain, Base, is now global, having been made officially available in more than 140 countries. There had been some speculation among analysts that had gotten wind of the coming product announcement that upgrades to the Base network might say something about the release of a native blockchain token.
“We continue to explore the potential for a Base token, but have no updates to share at this time,” Branzburg said.
