Coinbase’s share price on the stock exchange continues to falter

Despite making significant gains in the past week, Coinbase’s share price on the stock exchange has continued in its almost inexorable descent, losing 11% in the past five days.

History of Coinbase’s listing on the stock exchange

For sure, the listing of the Coinbase exchange, which got off to an encouraging start a little over a year and a half ago, immediately skyrocketed its stock above $340. Yesterday Coinbase closed on the exchange at just over $63.

The negative cryptocurrency market has certainly affected the stock quite a bit, but some internal problems at the exchange have also led to a loss of investor confidence in Brian Armstrong‘s company.

For example, the recent investigation opened by the SEC against it for allegedly selling unauthorized securities. Merely the news of the investigation opened in July this year sent the stock price plunging 21% in a single day.

Yet in August, in the wake of news of a deal with US asset management giant Blackrock, which would open the digital currency market to institutional clients, Coinbase had posted a 62% gain in a week, up from a paltry +3.5%.

According to some experts, the decline in recent weeks is also due to the fact that Nasdaq recently decided to launch a custody service for cryptocurrencies. According to the Financial Times, this move would be just the first step toward opening up the largest tech market to the cryptocurrency sunset.

And it is clear that this could represent a heavy blow to those like Coinbase that are making cryptocurrency trading their business. For all these reasons, Coinbase announced in recent weeks a drastic staff reduction plan 

Coinbase launches trading without fees 

Perhaps partly to address these difficulties, the company has decided to launch a new trading service without fees. 

This involves trading on the USDC stablecoin. In some ways, this move seems rather sensational, given that more than 90% of Coinbase’s business comes precisely from trading fees. But it will allow more users around the world to trade USDC on Coinbase’s fast and secure platform in almost every region where Coinbase operates.

So this is yet another fantastic move to broaden the user base in all the countries in which it operates and yet another attempt to counter increasingly fierce competition.

Peter Stilwell, Head of Business Operations & Strategy (EMEA) at Coinbase, commented on this decision: 

“Developing a decentralized financial system that works for all is an aim that sits at the core of Coinbase’s mission. By removing friction points from USDC trading, we help to better serve our users and reinforce the principles of borderless financial systems. Our decision levels the playing field for users around the world by allowing them to buy and sell USDC without additional fees, and will come as welcome news to many.”

The partnership with Google 

Another important step toward greater cryptocurrency adoption is the important partnership closed with the web search juggernaut Google to accept cryptocurrency payments starting next year.

According to news that appeared on CNBC, a few days ago Google has decided to use Coinbase’s cryptocurrency custody tool. 

According to what are the first rumors, the Google Cloud Platform service will initially accept cryptocurrency payments from some customers in the Web3 world, thanks precisely to an integration with the Coinbase Commerce service, said Amit Zavery.

Thanks to this news, Coinbase’s stock managed to gain 4.6%, after rising as much as 9%.