Bernstein Cuts Coinbase Price Target to $250 From $330, Raises Outlook for Robinhood and Circle

Bernstein lowered its earnings forecast and price target for Coinbase, citing weak cryptocurrency trading, while striking a more positive tone on Robinhood and Circle.

The firm maintained its Outperform ratings on Coinbase, Robinhood and Circle in a report published on Oct. 26 and cited by The Block the same day. Bernstein said prediction markets, derivatives and tokenization are poised to become bigger revenue drivers than spot crypto trading.

Bernstein cut its Coinbase price target to $250 from $330, a reduction of about 24%, on the view that a recovery in crypto trading volumes is taking longer than expected. It also lowered its forecast for this year's revenue by 32% to $5.5 billion and changed its earnings-per-share estimate to a loss of $2.60 from an earlier profit forecast of $5.97.

Analysts led by Gautam Chhugani wrote that they are no longer building further gains in cryptocurrency prices into their earnings outlook. They still project Coinbase's prediction-market and derivatives revenue will rise to about $2 billion by 2028 from about $600 million at the start of this year.

For Robinhood, Bernstein maintained its $160 price target. The firm estimates Robinhood's prediction-market revenue will reach $1.7 billion in 2028, exceeding its projected $1.6 billion in crypto trading revenue. It forecasts third-quarter event-contract volume will increase 21% from the previous quarter to about 16.4 billion contracts.

Bernstein raised its price target on Circle to $145 from $140. The change reflects a decline in USDC circulation to about $73 billion from $77 billion in the second quarter, as well as expectations for token presales on its Arc blockchain and income from managing reserve assets. The firm estimated third-quarter revenue at about $770 million.

Bernstein said Arc could become a new source of revenue for Circle. In addition to interest income from USDC reserve assets, the blockchain could generate transaction fees and validator staking income.

As of Oct. 26, Coinbase shares were trading at about $162, down more than 31% from the start of the year. Robinhood had fallen about 17.5%, while Circle was up about 1.5%, making it the only one of the three still in positive territory for the year.