Wall Street bank Goldman Sachs said it was “selectively constructive” on brokers and crypto firms heading into 2026, arguing that a resilient retail environment and continued regulatory progress should support growth.
“We expect the intersection between traditional retail brokerage and cryptocurrency trading to continue in 2026, leading to increased competition, which could impact market share and product pricing,” analysts led by James Yaro wrote in Monday’s report.
The bank upgraded crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN) to Buy from Neutral and raised its price target from $294 to $303, implying an upside of over 30%. Shares were up 4.3% in early trading Monday, alongside a rally in crypto prices late Sunday.
The bank downgraded eToro (ETOR) to neutral from buy and reduced its price target from $48 to $39. The stock was down 1.2% at $35.27 in premarket trading.
Yaro and his team continued with buy ratings on Robinhood (HOOD), Interactive Brokers (IBKR), and Figure Technology (FIGR).
Coinbase’s size and brand strength are seen as key drivers of higher revenue growth and market share gains than its peers, Yaro said. It forecasts COIN’s compound annual revenue growth rate (CAGR) of 12% through 2027, compared to 8% for peers, supported by best-in-class customer acquisition costs.
Yaro and his team also highlighted recent product launches in brokerage, banking, wealth and tokenization, saying they improve the company’s competitiveness and position it to expand structural growth areas such as prediction markets.
At the same time, the bank is optimistic about the expansion of Coinbase’s subscription and services business, which now accounts for about 40% of revenue, and expects it to see steady growth and reduce earnings volatility as crypto use cases expand beyond trading.
“While it continues to deliver healthy growth, competition is intensifying in its core market and products, which could drive higher customer acquisition costs and prices and impact planned expansion in the United States,” the analysts said of eToro in their downgrade.
Learn more: Citi still believes in crypto stocks despite Bitcoin being rocked to end the year
