For those still fixated on altcoins, just go all in on HOOD

Original: Odaily Planet Daily (@OdailyChina)

Author: Azuma (@azuma_eth)

Recently, Robinhood (HOOD) stock has shown strong performance, briefly crossing the $100 mark last night. Although it failed to close above that level, I remain optimistic about HOOD's future performance.

During the recent downtrend, HOOD was one of the few assets I consistently accumulated (including through swaps). So I've wanted to write an article about HOOD for a while now. In a previous Odaily Chat Session, I briefly shared my accumulation logic. Today, with the stock price performing well, I'd like to elaborate further. Please note, this is not investment advice nor does it represent the views of the platform, just some personal thoughts behind my HOOD accumulation.

Multi-Dimensional Bullish Analysis

Regarding the recent rally in HOOD, you can find many bullish explanations across different dimensions.

Let's start with the fundamentals. Robinhood released its May operating data last week. Details are as follows.

• Total Assets: $377 billion, an all-time high;
• Funded Customers: 27.7 million, an all-time high;
• Margin Book: $19.5 billion, an all-time high;
• Event Contracts: 3.9 billion contracts, an all-time high;
• Cash & Deposits: $18.6 billion, an all-time high;
• Options ADV: 11.6 million contracts, tying the historical record;
• Equity Volume: $315 billion, the second highest on record;
• Options Contracts: 231 million contracts, the second highest on record;
• The only weak data point was Crypto Volume: $12.2 billion, ranking only 16th in monthly history...

Some positive factors on the news front might stir investor sentiment even more.

• First, in the fastest-growing prediction market sector, Robinhood has started using its own prediction market, Rothera, to capture volume from Kalshi, meaning future related revenue likely won't need to be shared with Kalshi. For details, see our yesterday's article "The First Prediction Market Concept Stock Has Arrived!".
• Second, regarding IPOs, SpaceX's historic IPO brought record-breaking traffic to Robinhood. More importantly, Robinhood's broker-dealer and clearing business unit, Robinhood Securities, was approved last week to act as an IPO underwriter. This means Robinhood can play a more central role in future IPOs (e.g., Anthropic, OpenAI).
• Third, Robinhood was selected by the U.S. Treasury to serve as the broker and initial trustee for the "Trump Account." The so-called "Trump Account" is a tax-deferred investment account plan authorized by President Trump on June 9, 2025, under the "Big and Beautiful" bill, aiming to establish government-funded savings accounts for U.S. citizen children born between January 1, 2025, and January 1, 2029. This means tens of millions of newborns in the coming years will default to using Robinhood as their brokerage platform. For details, see "Robinhood Gains a Batch of New Investors, the Oldest is 1, the Youngest is -3".

Regarding market dynamics, there are some more direct signals.

• Robinhood director Meyer Malka has been consistently increasing his HOOD holdings. Over the past week or two, Malka has accumulated over $50 million worth of HOOD.
• Institutions are also offering more positive price targets for HOOD. Goldman Sachs maintains a "Buy" rating and raised its target price from $105 to $108; Mizuho has a target price of $115; Piper Sandler is the most optimistic, with a target price of $135.

Personally, my initial reason for accumulating HOOD was bullishness on its Q2 earnings, driven by expectations of an explosive stock trading revenue quarter amid the historic U.S. stock market rally, and a surge in prediction market volume from the World Cup, along with Rothera's revenue capture.

However, the reason I later swapped a significant portion of my portfolio (mainly some residual crypto assets) into HOOD is based on another logic, which is the real focus of this article.

An Alternative to Altcoins

In early May, a friend asked what I had been buying recently. I mentioned HOOD, but at that time, HOOD had just dropped from above $90 due to disappointing Q1 earnings (mainly due to an unexpected $100 million "Trump Account" related expense), and its short-term trajectory looked quite poor.

My friend asked why I bought it, and I briefly explained the reasons above. He thought for a moment and said it was a pity his positions were locked up, with little ammunition left. I asked what he was holding, and unsurprisingly, it was mostly altcoins.

I told him then: "Instead of clinging to altcoins, you might as well swap your holdings into HOOD."

The context for this judgment is that, for a long time past, cryptocurrency-related revenue was a major component of Robinhood's total revenue, and HOOD's stock price movement was strongly correlated with cryptocurrencies. However, recently, there are signs that Robinhood is breaking free from its dependence on crypto operations and actively decoupling from this correlation.

First, let's look at Robinhood's cryptocurrency-related revenue over the past five quarters. It's easy to see that overall, the proportion of this revenue is declining, and in Q1, it dropped to a new low since 2025.

• 2025 Q1: Total revenue $927M, crypto revenue $329M, accounting for 35%;
• 2025 Q2: Total revenue $989M, crypto revenue $160M, accounting for 16%;
• 2025 Q3: Total revenue $1.274B, crypto revenue $268M, accounting for 21%;
• 2025 Q4: Total revenue $1.283B, crypto revenue $221M, accounting for 17%;
• 2026 Q1: Total revenue $1.067B, crypto revenue $134M, accounting for 13%.

Next, look at the direct comparison of HOOD and BTC price movements. Since the start of the year, HOOD has mostly tracked BTC's trajectory, but recently, there has been a clear divergence.

Highlighting these two points primarily aims to show that the valuation logic surrounding HOOD has started to change. In the past, HOOD was often viewed as a "proxy stock" for the crypto market, its business performance exhibiting clear cyclicality alongside crypto bull and bear markets – crypto market surges, retail investors flood Robinhood to trade altcoins, fee revenue skyrockets, stock price takes off; crypto market slumps, retail exits, Robinhood's revenue quickly declines.

But now, Robinhood is no longer as highly dependent on its crypto business. Even if the crypto market continues its current lackluster state, its stock trading, prediction market, Pre-IPO, and new underwriting businesses are still expected to support its growth.

This doesn't mean the crypto market won't affect HOOD anymore. Quite the opposite, if the crypto market returns to a bull cycle, Robinhood's crypto trading revenue will likely surge concurrently, and HOOD will still benefit from industry growth.

In simpler terms, the crypto world can still influence HOOD, but HOOD no longer depends on the crypto world – if the crypto bull market returns, HOOD will follow; if the crypto market stays sluggish, HOOD won't mind.

For everyone who still holds expectations for altcoins but is increasingly worried about liquidity drying up, narrative failing, and value capture issues, instead of continuing to pin hopes on a token that may not see its next narrative cycle anytime soon, HOOD might be a safer option with higher margin of safety.