Coinbase Unveils 1:1 Tokenized Stocks as CFTC Defends US Perps, Robinhood Cuts 10%

Crypto News

Robinhood is cutting 10% of its workforce, roughly 290 employees, as crypto trading revenue cools. CEO Vlad Tenev framed the move in an internal note as a push toward a leaner, flatter organization, notably avoiding the term AI that has dominated recent Silicon Valley layoff messaging. The brokerage's crypto transaction revenue fell 34% sequentially to $134 million from $221 million, exposing its reliance on traders who have grown less active. A regulatory filing pegs restructuring and severance costs near $28 million. Tenev insisted the business has never been stronger, even as shares have slid roughly 12% year-to-date amid the broader downturn.

Wall Street is moving to treat computing power as a tradable commodity. CME Group and Intercontinental Exchange both confirmed plans to launch AI compute futures later this year, with CME chairman Terry Duffy declaring that compute is the new oil of the 21st century. CME partnered with Silicon Data on contracts tied to daily GPU benchmark rental rates, while ICE teamed with index provider Ornn for cash-settled contracts. The push responds to extreme volatility: NVIDIA H100 rental prices climbed 38.2% between October 2025 and March 2026. AI developers, cloud providers and hedge funds are expected to be the primary participants.

Coinbase announced it will roll out genuine 1:1 asset-backed tokenized stocks, letting users trade, hold and redeem shares of US companies entirely onchain while automatically receiving dividends. The exchange stressed the product carries no derivatives and no IOUs, distinguishing it from synthetic alternatives and from on-chain AMM-based equity exposure. Citing securities rules, Coinbase confirmed the service will initially be limited to eligible jurisdictions outside the United States, with a livestream planned to reveal further mechanics. The move adds momentum to the real-world asset narrative and sharpens competition in tokenized equities. Community speculation immediately centered on whether issuance will deploy on Coinbase's Base layer-2 network.

SpaceX shares extended a historic rally, with the newly listed SPCX climbing past $210 in pre-market trading and briefly pushing its valuation beyond $3 trillion, a fresh all-time high. The surge lifted the company's market cap to roughly $2.8 trillion, overtaking Amazon to become the world's fifth-largest public company. After pricing its record-setting IPO at $135 and raising $75 billion, the stock has gained nearly 20% on consecutive sessions. With 2025 revenue around $18.7 billion, its price-to-sales ratio now towers over established tech giants, prompting Wall Street warnings about a possible space valuation bubble built on Starlink and orbital AI infrastructure expectations.

CFTC Chair Michael Selig publicly defended a wave of US crypto perpetual futures approvals, dismissing opposition with the line that incumbents are always afraid of the future. Selig argued the agency's goal is to bring perpetual products, long dominated by offshore venues handling over $60 trillion in annual volume, back under domestic oversight. Addressing retail-risk concerns, he stressed that perpetual futures listed on CFTC-regulated venues must meet the same leverage and margin requirements as other regulated US futures. The remarks followed approvals for Kalshi, Coinbase and Kraken products, with Kraken Pro launching nine major-coin perps including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Solana and XRP.

Humanity Protocol opted to scrap its compromised $H token entirely after an exploit saw roughly 447 million tokens stolen or maliciously minted. The biometric identity project said old $H on Ethereum, BNB Smart Chain and its own mainnet will be retired, replaced by a fresh Ethereum ERC-20 token distributed via a 1:1 airdrop to eligible holders based on a pre-attack snapshot. Attacker-linked addresses are excluded entirely. External wallets receive tokens directly, while smart-contract positions await coordination. The mainnet will relaunch within weeks using the new token for gas, though buyers who entered after the snapshot must file compensation claims.

Across these developments runs a single thread: traditional finance and crypto rails are converging just as risk appetite collapses. COINOTAG's aggregate market data captures the tension. The Fear & Greed Index sits at 23, deep in Extreme Fear, while Bitcoin dominance has climbed to 69.6% and total crypto market capitalization has compressed to roughly $1.92 trillion, signaling capital fleeing altcoins for safety in a bear market. Coinbase's tokenized equities and the CFTC's onshore perps push institutional infrastructure forward, yet the Humanity exploit and Robinhood's revenue squeeze underscore unresolved fragility. The official filings, exchange announcements and on-chain snapshots behind these stories show ambition outpacing caution in a guarded market.