First quarter results are in for cryptocurrency and stock trading app Robinhood, with the company reporting a 30% year-on-year revenue drop for its crypto trading business.
Released May 10, Robinhood’s Q1 2023 earnings revealed $38 million in crypto trading revenues over the period, down from $54 million in Q1 2022.
Robinhood’s total revenue, however, increased year-on-year, with Q1 2023 bringing in $441 million, compared to 2022’s first quarter net revenue of $299 million — an increase of around 47.5%.
Its Q1 2023 revenue was also up 16% from the last quarter. Interest was the company’s biggest earner, due to the United States Federal Reserve’s recent and rapid rate hikes.
Around $12 billion worth of crypto is currently under the custody of the trading app, a 50% increase over the quarter, though it is down 40% compared to the same time last year.
The trading app’s drop in crypto revenue aligns with the 40% fall in market capitalization for digital assets over the same period. The global market cap for crypto stood at $2.1 trillion on March 31, 2022, compared to $1.2 trillion on the same date this year, according to CoinGecko data.
Monthly active users on Robinhood also fell year-on-year, going from nearly 16 million in 2022’s first quarter to just under 12 million in the most recent earnings report. That’s still an increase of 400,000 from the previous quarter, however.
Overall, Robinhood recorded a net loss of $511 million, impacted by “a one-time $485 million share-based compensation expense” due to its co-founders “canceling their 2021 market-based restricted stock unit awards in February 2023,” the company explained in an accompanying press release.
The loss was Robinhood’s largest since Q3 2021 and a 30% increase in losses year-on-year.
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”The firm also said it “continues to pursue purchasing most or all” of the 55 million shares from Emergent Fidelity Technologies — the offshore investment vehicle used by FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried to purchase a nearly 8% stake in Robinhood.
“Discussions are ongoing with the related parties,” it added. “We cannot predict when, or if, the share purchase will take place.”
The same day, Robinhood said it’s starting to roll out 24-hour trading for 43 of its most popular exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and stocks such as Apple, Tesla and Amazon.
The rollout will begin May 16, with availability to all users slated for June.
Robinhood shares closed slightly down on the day but were up 3% in after-hours trading, according to Google Finance.
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Update (May 11, 1:00 am UTC): This article has been updated to include more information from the earnings report and accompanying statements.
Source: https://cointelegraph.com/news/robinhood-s-q1-crypto-revenue-drops-30-from-the-previous-year