Chaos at Coinbase - An Uncertain Future

this video is brought to you by bespoke post stick around here more about the special offer they're providing to the entire upper echelon Community alright today I want to talk about coinbase a little bit different than normal I don't have Insider sources on this or whistleblowers it's not one of the more standard investigations the truth is I just want to talk about it also I have

an indie Spotlight coming for a game named War Tales because it's unbelievably good I feel like a kid again I'm waiting for every single opportunity I can possibly find to play it and I miss video games that'll come later down the line let's begin trading under the ticker of coin coinbase is one of the most enigmatic companies I've ever seen and is now going toe-to-toe with

the SEC over a lack of crypto security Guidance the topic is swirling across social media or at least it was when I initially started looking at all this and the platform is positioning itself as the mainstream savior of crypto capable of providing case law and clarifying in Big Air quotes the world of crypto in the United States in theory that's fine but I don't think it's

quite so simple the information I've seen makes me highly skeptical and I find myself more of the opinion that coinbase knows it's going to lose doesn't really even want crypto regulation and is doing this as a smoke screen why I have no idea but let's take a closer look coinbase is obviously a crypto exchange not the largest crypto exchange by volume but certainly very significant founded

in 2012 by a man named Brian Armstrong coinbase experienced explosive growth in Venture Capital interest right out the gate 5 million in 2013 the largest Venture Capital sign on for a Bitcoin startup at the time led by Union Square Ventures turned into 25 million the following year with Andreessen Horowitz leading the round all signs pointed to explosive growth but the money didn't stop there in 2015

the company accomplished a 75 million investment round LED by Draper Fisher jervetsen establishing yet another industry record at the time and I'll spare everyone a 30-minute technical rundown of how the business changed or grew or operated or what features they launched because no one cares but the important thing to know is that coinbase was becoming a household name it was the Paragon the gold standard and

the unassailable White Knight of crypto not a bad position to be in massive Partnerships such as PayPal Overstock Dell time stripe Dish Network and more pave the way for widespread adoption of the coinbase platform with original incorporation during 2012 and a holding company established in Delaware during 2014 but the most important Landmark to focus on is the IPO the initial public offering February 25th 2021 coinbase

files with the Securities and Exchange Commission the SEC to publicly list the company under the ticker coin this is a big moment for them Elation success Fame and Fortune publicly listing allowed them to Revel in the success of traditional financial markets hell even Jim Cramer was on board saying quote we like coinbase 475 dollars a colossal sum by the way truth be told the company seemed

to deserve the title of crypto savior with everything running in their favor but as is true with every single Market in all of human history what goes up must come down all right before going further let's talk about today's video sponsor which is once again bespoke post the sales pitch here is actually very very easy believe it or not I already collected the knives from bespoke

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that link down below coinbase was enjoying an incredible level of growth but not everything they touched turned to gold one of the notable fiascos under their belt later down the line came after a Super Bowl ad with a floating QR code the advertisement cost them 13 million dollars this cost them 13 million dollars but when it finally went live the website crashed oddly enough this hilarious

chain of events is in my opinion indicative of the firm itself which is now an idol of crypto enthusiasm partially viewed by some as the impending savior of the space and I can't stress that enough that is how they are viewed by a hefty chunk of the crypto Community from high to low that's the story of coinbase call it whatever you want the truth is coinbase

has now fallen roughly 80 percent since its all-time high shortly after IPO and the troubles don't stop there turns out one of coinbase's managers was insider trading they've actually pled guilty to those charges now after feeding private information about upcoming token releases of the platform to their brother I think it was ishan wahi has finally pled guilty to multiple counts of conspiracy to commit wire fraud

and while coinbase has also been awarded restitution in the matter the case even existing is far from ideal what's worse this would not be the only time that they grappled with the SEC it's merely just the first example the SEC would eventually start rattling its saber officially threatening coinbase with an official lawsuit in March of 2023. this game is a smaller part of a larger Crackdown

where the crypto industry at large is now squaring off with U.S Regulators in a multitude of theaters over what should happen next but it gets bit more interesting after that according to data published by business of apps and bankless times coinbase had 9 million Maus monthly active users as of August 2022. 51 percent of which the majority however slim were local to the United States some

estimates are even higher while over 80 percent of their revenue in 2022 as per Financial disclosures by the company itself was attributed to local U.S residents either through domicile or booking location that's the Lion's Share of their entire business why am I so interested simple coinbase is now threatening to leave the United States as its business Capital unless they provide Clarity on regulations again Big Air

quotes AKA we are threatening to destroy our entire business and mutilate the company's value for all of our investors unless you give us more clarity on regulations that's not really a whole lot of bargaining power here's the thing this lawsuit right here well calling it a lawsuit isn't super accurate by the way it's more of a petition for compelled rule-making of sorts in my understanding at

least but anyway this action right here supported by their threat to leave the country doesn't make sense why doesn't it make sense because of this turns out in January of 2023 a few months before their Endeavor to compel SEC guidance on the matter coinbase actually pulled out completely from the country of Japan actually they weren't alone here either Kraken also pulled out just a couple weeks

prior this could be due to cost cutting as the two companies have claimed but what if there was a different motive shout out to Parrot capital and Dirty Bubble media their Twitter profiles are linked Down Below in the description they were responsible for finding certain pieces of information which were extremely relevant to this video the collapse of FTX rocked the world of crypto to its very

core but it also gave us some unique insights into the Japanese crypto markets Insight we didn't have before or at least I didn't have before nor likely would have ever gotten without such an event see Japan has very strict crypto regulations very very strict regulations mainly pertaining to the segregation of assets which left them with a unique ability to protect their local customers in the aftermath

of the FTX implosion FTX Japan in particular was the very first country to resume total withdrawals symbolizing a lesser-known reality which was that Japan had crypto regulation not just the basics they had crypto regulation that was most importantly working comprehensive and effective why then would coinbase as well as Kraken for that matter pull out of the country entirely is it really a cost-cutting initiative or is

it something else if it truly were all about the bottom line and cost cutting why would coinbase pull out of a country that has proper regulation remain in a country that doesn't and then threaten to leave that country unless regulation is now crafted threatening the majority of their own user base and business model and the Lion's Share of their revenue in the process how does that

make any sense the truthful answer is it doesn't maybe they have a justification but if they do I don't see it presented here today and I have not been able to find it and that's when the picture really started to form Insider buy and and cell data from Market beat paints a troubling picture over the past six months alone just one coinbase Insider has been systematically

buying or buying at all for that matter that would be director Tobias luteke CEO of Shopify he has purchased roughly three million seven hundred thousand dollars worth of common stock in 10 separate transactions that's pretty good to see since Insider buying and selling can be an indication of executive confidence in the company but he is decidedly alone in this Regard in just the past six months

well I'll just I'll list them in ascending order from December 2022 to May 2023 roughly the period of time where coinbase has been butting heads with the SEC most viciously the following transactions took place one hundred thousand dollars worth of selling by Insider Paul grebel five hundred thousand dollars worth of Insider selling by CAO Jennifer N Jones 10.7 million dollars of stock sold off by CFO

Alicia J Haas and the kicker here 17.3 million dollars in what appears to be exclusively sell side activity from CEO Brian Armstrong here's where I feel like I have to ask a question if you are the CEO of a company why are you pulling out of a country that has regulatory Clarity while demanding regulatory Clarity from the country where 80 of your revenue and 51 of

your customers are only to then threaten withdrawal from that country as well why is it that the CEO of a company that has already lost roughly 83 percent of its public share price since launch in a short span of time relatively speaking is offloading close to 20 million dollars in stock at what should realistically be the Rock Bottom price per share if coinbase has any sort

of legitimate future at the same time as the company withdraws from Japan and threatens to leave the United States which would have an unbelievably negative impact on their financial future does he lack confidence in the direction of regulatory efforts does he know something we don't I do have a lot of questions the way I see it with pure speculation on my part just want to be

clear about that coinbase doesn't actually want crypto regulation Clarity they thrive in a landscape that lacks Clarity inversely showcased by their decision to leave Japan even though Japan protected customer assets better than pretty much any other country in the world when it came to FTX which was a Monumental disaster meanwhile knowing that the company has now demanded action from a country that will likely come down

hard on crypto if the current pattern holds true the CEO of that company is offloading millions and millions of dollars worth of company stock every single chance that he gets again speculation and opinion because he knows that the future for his company is Bleak at best meanwhile the broader crypto Community deludes themselves into thinking that coinbase is somehow their savior I don't see how that could

ever be possible but hey at the end of the day I just wanted to look at all this and I wanted to talk about it my opinion here is that coinbase is high and dry picking a fight they cannot and likely will not win they demonstrated their true intentions perfectly as they withdrew from a market that realistically should be their Target location if they actually actually

future bag holders that's about it my opinion is that coinbase is kind of like the Titanic regulation is in effect the iceberg and by having such an extreme concentration of user capital in the United States alone and refusing to diversify jurisdictions because that is what they are doing by withdrawing from Japan or something like that they're refusing to diversify even when those jurisdictions have the clarity

that they pretend to want they have not turned the wheel fast enough or turned the helm or avoided the iceberg and thus they're about to hit it like be wrong I guess I kind of hope I'm wrong because people losing money in the current climate is obviously extremely unfortunate no matter how it happens or when but right now with the data I have and the opinions

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