Coinbase released its first financial report, with a net profit of more than US$771 million in the first quarter, and plans to provide Dogecoin trading in the next 6-8 weeks

On Thursday, cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase released the company's first quarter financial report for fiscal year 2021, the first financial report released by the company since its IPO (initial public offering).

The report showed that Coinbase's net profit in the first quarter was US$771.5 million, more than four times the US$177 million in the fourth quarter of 2020, a 3.36-fold increase from the previous quarter, and more than 24 times the profit in the same period last year.

As of the first quarter of 2021, the platform has more than 56 million verified users and a transaction volume of 335 billion. Monthly trading users more than doubled from the previous quarter, from 2.8 million to 6.1 million.

Coinbase reported first-quarter earnings per share of $3.05 on revenue of $1.8 billion, up from $585 million in the fourth quarter of 2020 and $191 million in the same period last year. Coinbase's stock price has fallen by about 30.4% since its IPO on April 14, excluding after-hours trading, closing at $265.10 on Thursday, a daily drop of 6.53%.

In addition, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said in a conference call after the company officially released its first-quarter earnings report: "We plan to offer Dogecoin trading in the next 6-8 weeks."

Dogecoin’s price has been on a roller coaster ride recently, peaking just before Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s appearance on “Saturday Night Live” last weekend but plunging since then.

During the call, Armstrong also noted that the crypto economy is adding “more and more assets,” likening the process of adding new cryptocurrencies to that of adding apps to an app store.

Another popular question concerned Coinbase’s views on decentralized exchanges. Armstrong said the company is “very excited” about so-called DeFi, but did not provide details on its specific strategy.

In response to a question about Coinbase’s higher fees than some exchanges, CFO Alesia Haas said: “We’re not trying to win on fees, we’re trying to win on trust.”

Coinbase, whose fortunes are tied to the performance of digital assets such as Bitcoin, generated about 94% of its net revenue in the first quarter from transaction fees.

Haas said the company’s main focus in the first quarter was reliability. “We are dealing with an unprecedented increase in demand and are focused on ensuring our exchanges remain stable.”