New York, January 6, 2026, 18:29 EST — After-hours
- COIN fell in late trade as bitcoin eased, trimming a two-day run of sharp swings.
- A filing showed CEO Brian Armstrong plans to sell 40,000 shares under a pre-arranged trading plan.
- Goldman Sachs upgraded Coinbase to “buy” on Monday and lifted its price target.
Coinbase Global shares fell 1.7% to $250.56 in after-hours trading on Tuesday, paring gains from a rally sparked by a bullish Goldman Sachs call a day earlier. Bitcoin was down about 0.6% at $93,442, pressuring crypto-linked shares.
Traders have been treating Coinbase as a high-beta proxy for crypto activity, with the stock moving quickly on shifts in bitcoin and brokerage sentiment. The shares jumped 7.8% on Monday after Goldman upgraded the exchange to “buy” from “neutral,” in a broader risk-on session. 1
Why it matters now: investors are weighing whether Coinbase’s push into newer lines of business can cushion earnings if spot trading volumes cool again in early 2026. A packed U.S. data slate this week has markets on guard for any reset in rate bets, a key input for risk appetite. 2
A Form 144 filing dated Jan. 5 showed CEO Brian Armstrong plans to sell up to 40,000 shares, with an aggregate market value of about $10.2 million, through Goldman Sachs & Co. Form 144 is a notice of a proposed sale; the filing said the transactions were tied to a pre-arranged Rule 10b5-1 plan adopted in August. 3
Goldman raised its 12-month price target on Coinbase to $303 from $294, according to reports of the note. Analyst James Yaro said recent product launches broadened Coinbase’s reach and “give it exposure to what we view as structural growth tokenization and prediction markets.” 4
Goldman’s case rests on a business-mix shift: subscription and services revenue has grown to about 40% of Coinbase’s total, up from under 5% five years ago, the bank wrote. Those fees are less tied to trading volumes and can be less cyclical than transaction revenue, it argued. 5
Crypto sentiment also got a boost on Tuesday after Morgan Stanley filed for U.S. exchange-traded funds linked to bitcoin and solana, another sign big banks are leaning further into digital assets as rules evolve. The development has kept attention on listed crypto platforms such as Coinbase and retail-trading peer Robinhood as liquid ways to play the theme. 6
Still, Coinbase’s results remain sensitive to swings in crypto prices and activity, and a deeper pullback in bitcoin can sap trading volumes and retail risk-taking. Insider selling — even under scheduled plans — can also weigh on sentiment when the stock is choppy.
Next up, investors will watch the Employment Situation report for December on Friday at 8:30 a.m. ET and the Consumer Price Index for December on Jan. 13 at 8:30 a.m. ET for clues on the Federal Reserve’s next move. Coinbase has not announced the date for its fourth-quarter results; Nasdaq’s earnings calendar estimates a Feb. 12 report. On the chart, traders are eyeing support near Tuesday’s $246 low and last week’s $236 area, with resistance near $258. 7
