Barclays analyst Benjamin Budish downgraded Coinbase Global (NASDAQ:COIN) from Equal Weight to Underweight on April 8, cutting his price target to $140 from $148.

The thesis is simple: the retail trading boom that built Coinbase is over, and the company has yet to find anything to replace it.

Budish’s note puts the damage in plain terms. Despite a pro-crypto White House and a favorable regulatory backdrop, “global crypto trading activity has declined to a level not seen since the end of 2023,” he wrote.

Coinbase’s Q1 spot volume came in around $189 billion — down 30% from the prior quarter. Barclays is modeling transaction revenues of $678 million for the period, well short of the Street’s $876 million estimate.

March was Coinbase’s worst volume month since September 2024. April, he says, is showing no signs of a rebound.

The Everything Exchange Problem

Budish also questioned whether Coinbase’s “everything exchange” strategy can actually work. Equities trading, he argued, is a low-margin business where Coinbase has no edge. Prediction markets are a harder pill to swallow: he described the space as “rapidly being captured by newer entrants like Kalshi and Polymarket.”

Just two months ago, Coinbase’s own prediction markets head told Benzinga he had underpredicted how big the sector would get.

Coinbase already offers prediction markets, powered by Kalshi, available in all 50 states. It even bought a prediction market startup led by a former Polymarket and Kalshi executive. Wall Street, apparently, has not noticed.

Kalshi And Polymarket Are Winning

The retail crowd has not abandoned markets; they just found a new one.

In March 2026, prediction market nominal trading volume hit $25.7 billion, with Kalshi leading at $13.1 billion and Polymarket close behind at $10.6 billion.

That is roughly 16% of Coinbase’s entire Q1 spot volume, generated in a single month.

The sector is still navigating a jurisdictional fight between federal regulators and state attorneys general.

In the latest move, the federal government moved to block Arizona from criminally prosecuting Kalshi, a case that will determine whether prediction markets operate under one national framework or a state-by-state patchwork.

The Lone Bear

Budish’s call is a lonely one. Nineteen analysts have rated the stock with a Buy, ten with a Hold, and four with a Sell. Barclays is the most bearish voice on the Street by a wide margin.

The macro, however, is telling his story for him. Bitcoin (CRYPTO: BTC) is down roughly 18% year-to-date, trading near $72,000, a long way below the $126,000 all-time high it touched in October 2025.

COIN is down roughly 30% year-to-date. Q1 earnings are due May 7. The last time Coinbase reported, it missed estimates by 37%.

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