BlockBeats news: On May 25, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong unveiled eight visions for a "Global Financial Upgrade," covering areas such as tokenization of real-world assets, 24/7 global trading, stablecoin payments, AI-driven compliance, open protocols, capital formation, friendly regulation, and "sound money." These initiatives closely align with Coinbase’s current product expansion roadmap.
Coinbase is transitioning from a single cryptocurrency trading platform to a “comprehensive financial platform,” expanding its services into areas such as stock perpetual contracts, prediction markets, stablecoin payments, and financial infrastructure. In March of this year, Coinbase launched perpetual contracts for U.S. stocks like Apple and NVIDIA in select European regions; previously, it partnered with Shopify, Stripe, Nium, and Citibank to advance cross-border USDC payments and stablecoin settlements.
In addition, Coinbase launched a prediction market service supported by Kalshi in January this year, offering contracts on sports, political, and cultural events across all 50 U.S. states. Bernstein estimates that the annual trading volume of prediction markets could reach $1 trillion by 2030.
However, Armstrong’s concept of “sound money” has sparked discussion within the Bitcoin community, with The Bitcoin Bond Company CEO Pierre Rochard and Blockstream CEO Adam Back both stating that Bitcoin should be at the core of the new financial system, not merely the “last resort.”