Cardano (ADA-USD) prices are surging today on some extra attention from Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN). The centralized exchange appears to be taking its relationship with the Ethereum (ETH-USD) competitor a step further. Now, investors will be able to not just buy the ADA crypto on Coinbase; they will be able to earn passive income as well, without ever having to move the asset.
Centralized exchanges are taking great pains to promote keeping crypto on their platforms. After all, more assets under custody means greater legitimacy and, in turn, broader exposure among potential users. To that end, Coinbase is especially looking to broaden the amount of assets it hosts, even introducing its own custodial company as an independent counterpart to the exchange.
Another popular way these exchanges are promoting crypto is by introducing on-exchange decentralized finance (DeFi) tools. There is more than $80 billion in crypto assets locked into DeFi protocols right now; it’s one of the most popular ways people use their crypto because it allows them to earn passive income at a much higher rate than traditional banking. Exchanges have been noting this — and implementing their own staking pools to capitalize on the hype.
Coinbase is one of the first trading platforms to implement staking; the company offers an annual percentage rate (APR) of up to 5% on Ethereum, Algorand (ALGO-USD), Cosmos (ATOM-USD) and Tezos (XTZ-USD) and the stablecoins Dai (DAI-USD) and USDCoin (USDC-USD). Now, it’s looking to expand that offering to one of the fastest-growing layer-1 networks.
ADA Crypto Rising Thanks to New Coinbase Staking Exposure
Cardano has been making plenty of moves in recent months. After rolling out smart contracts in the fall of 2021, the network has slowly but surely grown the number of decentralized apps (dapps) on its platform. Just a few months later, it now hosts hundreds of dapps. Moreover, it has leaned into non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to great effect. Today, cofounder Charles Hoskinson is celebrating the milestone of four million NFTs minted natively on Cardano. The network is also celebrating ADA crypto landing a staking pool on Coinbase.
This week, Coinbase announced the introduction of ADA crypto staking on its platform. Users can buy ADA on the exchange and, without having to even transfer the assets to a wallet, stake the coins for a 3.75% annual percent yield (APY).
This news is not just helping COIN stock, which is up 4.5% so far today; the crypto is also using it to continue quite the bullish tear. ADA crypto prices are rising 8% amidst the news. These gains supplement an already impressive seven-day gain of around 38%. Transaction volume of the coin also continues to surge, with $3.7 billion in transactions marking a 30% increase over the past 24 hours.
On the date of publication, Brenden Rearick did not hold (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.
