Coinbase, perhaps the most famous American crypto company, announced today that it has filed for classified applications for an IPO. The company’s debut was expected, as it was reported earlier in the year.
Since the well-funded unicorn has made a secret, it appears that it will debut in early 2021. What kind of float the company will pursue is unclear at this point. Coinbase’s Ad is residential, as versions of this type tend to be so. The text of the blog post does not say whether Coinbase will pursue an IPO or direct listing, but a similar Slack message from early 2019 was similarly devoid of information; Slack became public via its Live List last year before it was recently approved to sell to Salesforce.
Coinbase raised widespread known capital while it is private, including $ 300 million from Series E in October of 2018. Series D in August 2017 was worth more than $ 100 million according to Crunchbase Tiger Global, Andreessen Horowitz, and DFJ Growth data. And IVP are among the investors who have led the rounds at crypto-focused fintech.
It is not clear how Coinbase’s revenue has grown, or how its profitable operations have proven or not in recent years. While there have been some reports of its historic growth, how the company has performed recently is not transparent. So, it’s hard to guess how good Coinbase’s forthcoming public valuation will be with the $ 8 billion private valuation.
The company is going public, amid increasing interest in cryptocurrencies, as prices have risen for many in recent months. TechCrunch explored the trend earlier today.
Coinbase was also on a number of controversial sites in 2020, including losing dozens of employees after its CEO announced that the company would not be involved in any political matters that were not, in his view, directly related to the company’s mission. The dialogue that followed about the company’s decision was loud.
Regardless, with Roblox and Affirm now taking an early path to 2021 for their IPOs, we can add Coinbase to the list of companies we expect to launch in January.
