Why Coinbase is undervalued, according to a top Wall Street analyst

Episode 49 of Season 4 of The Scoop was recorded remotely with The Block’s Frank Chaparro and Mark Palmer, Managing Director and Senior Equity Research Analyst at BTIG.

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Coinbase shares are down over 70% on the year, a state of affairs compounded by a rough Q1, but one leading Wall Street analyst believes Coinbase may be undervalued. 

In this episode of The Scoop, Mark Palmer — managing director and fintech analyst at global financial services firm BTIG — shares why his firm is bullish on a narrative shift on Wall Street regarding Coinbase stock in the coming months.

As Palmer contended during the show:

“Coinbase has developed itself over the last ten years, largely via acquisition… and over time, this is going to become much less of a retail trading story and much more about a sort of crypto supermarket that's going to have an awful lot of different revenue drivers.”

Palmer points to the 2021 acquisition of Bison Trails as an example of Coinbase’s horizontal expansion. As Coinbase CPO Surojit Chatterjee and Bison Trails founder Joe Lallouz argued during an episode of The Scoop, the deal enhanced Coinbase’s crypto infrastructure services products, including institutional staking support.

Although Coinbase offers a wide range of crypto services, Palmer believes many Wall Street analysts tend to view Coinbase first and foremost through the lens of an exchange:

“There are a lot of folks who are covering some of the crypto exchanges and platforms that really aren't as focused on crypto — maybe they're focused on exchanges at large — and some of those distinctions and nuances, which are crucially important, get missed.”

During this episode, Chaparro and Palmer also discuss:

• Coinbase's balance sheet
• Upcoming crypto mergers and acquisitions
• The importance of 'narrative' to crypto markets

Editor's Note: While Coinbase is a sponsor of The Scoop podcast, this episode is not an endorsement of Coinbase stock or products, nor was it produced with involvement from Coinbase. All opinions expressed by host and podcast guest are solely their own opinions and not necessarily those of The Block. This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a basis for investment decisions.

This episode is brought to you by our sponsors Fireblocks, Coinbase Prime & Cross River
Fireblocks is an enterprise-grade platform delivering a secure infrastructure for moving, storing, and issuing digital assets. Fireblocks enables exchanges, lending desks, custodians, banks, trading desks, and hedge funds to securely scale digital asset operations through the Fireblocks Network and MPC-based Wallet Infrastructure. Fireblocks serves over 725 financial institutions, has secured the transfer of over $1.5 trillion in digital assets, and has a unique insurance policy that covers assets in storage & transit. For more information, please visit www.fireblocks.com.

About Coinbase Prime
Coinbase Prime is an integrated solution that provides institutional investors with an advanced trading platform, secure custody, and prime services to manage all their crypto assets in one place. Coinbase Prime fully integrates crypto trading and custody on a single platform, and gives clients the best all-in pricing in their network using their proprietary Smart Order Router and algorithmic execution. For more information, visit www.coinbase.com/prime.

About Cross River
Cross River is powering today’s most innovative crypto companies, with banking and payments solutions you can rely on, including fiat on/off ramp solutions. Whether you are a crypto exchange, NFT marketplace, or wallet, Cross River’s API-based, all-in-one platform enables banking as a service, ACH & wire transfers, push-to-card disbursements, real-time payments, and virtual accounts and subledgers. Request your fiat on/off ramp solution now at crossriver.com/crypto.