Coinbase Chief People Officer LJ Brock announced today that Coinbase plans to expand its product, engineering and design teams by as many as 2,000 employees this year to expand existing products and build new ones.
Coinbase says cryptocurrencies are at a pivotal moment — public adoption is at an all-time high, crypto companies are more visible than ever, and the explosion of Web3 applications is uncovering new possibilities every day. We see a huge product opportunity for the future of Web3. We believe our industry is still in its infancy, and building a pipeline of individual engagement is critical to driving the next generation of crypto use cases. We have an unwavering focus on long-term building through each crypto cycle. To date, it has been one of the biggest drivers of our success. Industry highs, and we’re focused on scaling. During the trough, we began to focus on product innovation. Whether the market is up or down, we see a clear opportunity to make Coinbase one of the most exciting places to work right now.
In addition, Coinbase Chief People Officer LJ Brock also said that Coinbase is also expanding to include products that host user-generated content (such as NFTs), while the plans for the Coinbase Wallet are also “ambitious”, and the team will work to enhance its security, ease of use and accessibility.
Coinbase’s focus on NFTs and Web3 has been revealed from its predictions at the beginning of the year. Coinbase’s prediction for 2022 at the time stated that NFT-based communities would bring substantial competition to the Web 2.0 social network, and brands would begin to actively participate in the Metaverse and NFTs.
Notably, the ambitious Coinbase also sponsored the Super Bowl. Coinbase Chief Marketing Officer Kate Rouch said in an interview that the traffic from advertising during the Super Bowl far exceeded expectations after the engineering team had load-tested the site to handle millions of simultaneous hits. But the actual traffic was staggering, with more than 20 million hits on Coinbase’s landing page in one minute, “historic and unprecedented.” Kate said Coinbase temporarily throttled the system and quickly brought the site back online due to the huge amount of short-term traffic.
Kate also noted that Coinbase has $10 million in funding for Super Bowl sign-ups and plans to offer more than $100 million in similar incentives in the future to help people access and participate in the crypto community year-round. The number of crypto ads at the Super Bowl is another sign that crypto is going mainstream and at the center of the cultural zeitgeist.
It is worth noting that, according to an analysis report released by Mizuho Securities at the end of January, the current downturn in the crypto market has made Coinbase stock unattractive in the first half of this year, and the company’s price target has been reduced from $300 to $300. $220. Mizuho lowered its medium-term forecast for Coinbase to reflect pressure in the cryptocurrency market and continued pressure on outflows.
Despite the downgrade, Coinbase’s stock price is still showing its strength from the data. Data shows that after hitting a new all-time high of nearly $69,000 on November 10, 2021, Bitcoin’s price has fallen by more than 39% by January 10, 2022. Shares of U.S.-listed miners Marathon Digital Holdings (MARA), Riot Blockchain (RIOT) and Bit Digital (BTBT) have all fallen by more than 50% during the period. Argo Blockchain (ARBK) shares fell 45%, while Canadian crypto miners Hive Blockchain (HIVE) and Hut 8 Mining Corp (HUT) fell 52% and 59%, respectively. Cryptocurrency exchange Voyager Digital (VYGVF) fell 50%, while shares of MicroStrategy (MSTR) fell 45%. Coinbase, on the other hand, lost 36% less than Bitcoin.
It is worth noting that the data on the positions of ARK Ark Fund, which has always been concerned about crypto investment, shows that since February 7th, ARK Fund has bought a total of 109,285 Coinbase shares (Coin).