Coinbase Stock Jumps Following Plans for $1 Billion Convertible Notes Sale

Coinbase will raise $1 billion in convertible senior notes in a private offering, the top crypto exchange announced on Tuesday. 

Coinbase stock—which trades as COIN on the Nasdaq—is up 3% today, priced at $263.86, Nasdaq data shows. It closed at $256 on Tuesday and rose above $268 on Wednesday morning before settling to the current price.

Over the past month, COIN is up nearly 90%. COIN hit its highest price since 2021, $271.65, earlier this week.

The idea behind the sale is that “qualified institutional buyers” will be able to convert the notes, which mature in 2030, into cash or shares of Coinbase’s Class A common stock—or a combination of both, the announcement read. 

Coinbase, which is America’s biggest digital asset exchange, also said that it will grant a 30-day option to allow the purchase of up to an additional $150 million of the securities to cover over-allotments. 

San Francisco-based Coinbase is following in the footsteps of software company MicroStrategy, which last month said it would offer a private sale of $600 million worth of convertible senior notes in order to purchase more Bitcoin. MicroStrategy is the single largest corporate holder of Bitcoin, with 205,000 BTC in its treasury—nearly $15 billion worth.

Coinbase, which went public in 2021, is working as the custodian and surveillance sharing partner for a number of major fund managers who launched spot Bitcoin exchange-traded products in January. 

The funds have been hugely successful so far, recording massive inflows and trading day volumes. Net inflows on Tuesday for the 10 ETFs passed the $1 billion mark—a record—and the funds now have over $60 billion in assets under management. 

Edited by Andrew Hayward