Coinbase custodies 11% of entire crypto capitalization

Crypto data aggregator Messari has reported that the amount of crypto assets stored in custody on United States exchange giant Coinbase surged in the last quarter of 2020.

Messari Crypto has revealed that as much as 11% of the entire crypto market capitalization was held with Coinbase custody at the end of 2020. Coinbase offers custody services for over 90 crypto assets, roughly half of which are tradable on Coinbase’s exchange.

The value of assets custodied with Coinbase spiked to roughly $90 billion in the fourth quarter of 2020 as the combined crypto capitalization more than doubled to tag $780 billion by 2021.

Coinbase custodies 11% of all crypto assets https://t.co/THPjyeqIto pic.twitter.com/5YHu6tNjyP

— Messari (@MessariCrypto) March 1, 2021

Despite the wide variety of assets supported by Coinbase Custody, Messari found that Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) account for 83% of the cryptocurrency held with Coinbase.

While Bitcoin consistently represented 70% of the assets custodied with Coinbase during 2019 and 2020, Ether increased from 9% to 13% over the same period.

The findings were published in a report examining Coinbase’s anticipated public listing that was compiled by Messari researcher Mira Christanto.

Christanto reported that 95% of Coinbase trading revenues are from retail clients, which pay 30 times more than institutional customers. She also noted a pre-IPO valuation at 7% of the total crypto market cap, which would equate to around $107 billion, according to the sector’s current market cap of $1.54 trillion.

According to the S-1 report Coinbase submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission last Thursday, the exchange posted a direct revenue of $1.1 billion in 2020, mostly from trading fees.

In a Thursday blog post to its clients, Coinbase revealed that Bitcoin and other crypto assets have comprised a major share of its corporate treasury since the company's founding back in 2012.