New York, May 21, 2026, 17:05 EDT
Webull Corp shares fell in late trading on Thursday after the online brokerage reported higher first-quarter revenue but swung to a net loss as marketing, transaction and stock-compensation costs climbed.
The report matters now because it gives investors a fresh read on retail trading demand just before new U.S. day-trading rules take effect in June. Webull’s Nasdaq-listed shares were last quoted at $6.61 at 4:47 p.m. EDT, about 5.4% below the prior close, after trading between $6.50 and $7.20 on volume of 32.7 million shares.
The move stood out on a broadly firmer tape. The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed at a record high, while the S&P 500 rose 0.17% and the Nasdaq Composite added 0.09%, Reuters reported.
Webull said total revenue rose 36% from a year earlier to $159.9 million in the quarter ended March 31. Under GAAP, the standard accounting rules used for U.S. financial reporting, the company posted a net loss attributable to Webull of $21.7 million, compared with net income of $13.1 million a year earlier.
The pressure came from costs. Total operating expenses rose 68% to $162.3 million, driven by higher marketing and branding expenses, brokerage and transaction costs, product expansion and share-based compensation, the filing showed. Adjusted operating profit, a non-GAAP measure that strips out some items such as share-based compensation, fell to $14.8 million from $28.7 million.
The trading metrics were stronger. Customer assets rose 90% year over year to $24.6 billion, while funded accounts increased to 5.11 million and registered users reached 27.6 million, according to the company’s investor presentation. Equity notional volume, the dollar value of stock trades handled on the platform, rose 104% to $261 billion. Options contracts volume rose 31% to 159 million.
Daily average revenue trades, or DARTs — a measure of how many customer trades generate revenue on an average day — rose to about 1.3 million. That is important for Webull because more active users can feed trading revenue, though the size and type of trades still matter.
Anthony Denier, Webull’s group president and U.S. CEO, called it a “strong start” to the company’s second year as a public company and pointed to AI tools, including beta testing for Vega Analyst. Chief Financial Officer H.C. Wang said Webull recorded “strong revenue growth” and its sixth straight quarter of adjusted profitability. PR Newswire
The competitive read-through is mainly to Robinhood. Both companies are exposed to active retail traders, and both rose in April after the SEC approved FINRA’s plan to remove the old $25,000 minimum equity requirement for pattern day traders. Northland analyst Mike Grondahl told Reuters at the time that more day trading means more orders per user per day, a direct revenue tailwind for brokerages.
FINRA said the new intraday margin standards take effect June 4, replacing the pattern day trader count rules and the $25,000 minimum, though member firms can phase in implementation until Oct. 20, 2027. Webull said it had built infrastructure for the change and expects more active trading under the new framework.
But the setup is not clean. Webull’s expenses are rising faster than revenue, and the business remains tied to trading activity, interest rates, market volatility and payment for order flow, the fees brokers can receive for routing customer orders. Its latest filing also flagged regulatory, cybersecurity, China-related, crypto and global expansion risks, along with the chance that its $100 million buyback plan could be suspended or changed.
For now, investors have a split picture: a broker still adding users, assets and trades, but spending heavily to chase that growth. The next test is whether the June rule change brings more volume without another squeeze on margins.
