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1. Gemini earnings report shows a split between retail and institutional clients
Gemini's earnings report for the third quarter of 2026, released on November 12, showed retail spot trading volume falling 14% from the prior quarter to $600 million, even as total spot volume climbed 18% to $4.5 billion. Institutional clients drove the gain, lifting their volume 26% to $3.9 billion.
The numbers describe an exchange whose two customer groups moved in opposite directions over the July to September period. Professional and corporate clients traded more, while individual users traded less, and the gap between the two has become one of the defining features of the company's latest results.
That divergence matters because the two groups do not contribute equally to the bottom line. Individual traders typically pay higher fees per dollar traded than large institutions, which negotiate lower rates and often trade through specialized channels. A shift in volume toward institutions can therefore lift headline activity without producing a matching rise in revenue.
2. What drove the rise in total spot volume?
Gemini attributed the increase in overall spot activity to two factors: heavier institutional trading in Zcash (ZEC) and a larger role for its affiliated market-making operation. Zcash is a privacy-focused cryptocurrency that allows transaction details to be shielded, and it has drawn renewed interest from professional traders.
Market making is the practice of continuously posting buy and sell orders so that other participants can trade without waiting for a counterparty. An exchange-affiliated market maker adds liquidity to the order books, and the trades it takes part in count toward reported volume. Expanding that function helps explain why institutional activity grew while the retail side shrank.
The company did not offer a specific explanation for the decline in individual trading. It simply reported the lower figure alongside the institutional gain, leaving the retail slowdown to be read against the broader conditions facing crypto platforms during the quarter.
3. Revenue still leans heavily on individual users
Exchange revenue rose 7% from the second quarter to $13.4 million. Revenue generated by institutional clients more than doubled over the period, a sizable jump that reflects their increased trading.
Even so, individual traders continued to supply nearly three-quarters of Gemini's exchange revenue. That concentration shows how dependent the business remains on retail participation. Institutions brought in far more volume, yet the smaller pool of retail activity still produced the bulk of the fees.
For an exchange, this mix creates a clear sensitivity. When retail users step back, the revenue impact is outsized relative to the change in volume, and gains on the institutional side have to be large to compensate. In the third quarter, a 7% rise in exchange revenue came despite the retail decline, but it fell well short of the 18% growth in total volume.
4. How retail and institutional trading differ on an exchange
Crypto exchanges generally divide their customers into two broad groups. Retail users are individuals who buy and sell through a website or mobile app, usually in relatively small amounts. Institutional clients include hedge funds, asset managers, trading firms and corporations, which move far larger sums and often connect to the exchange through dedicated software.
The economics of the two groups are very different. Individuals tend to pay a percentage-based fee on each trade, and those fees are typically higher than the rates offered to professional traders. Institutions trade in size, which gives them leverage to negotiate discounts, and some of their activity involves market makers whose role is to supply liquidity rather than to pay for it.
Because of that structure, the volume figures and the revenue figures reported by an exchange can tell different stories. A billion dollars of retail trading can produce many times the fee income of a billion dollars of institutional trading. Gemini's third-quarter numbers illustrate the point: institutions accounted for the large majority of volume, while individuals still generated most of the exchange fees.
Spot trading, the category at the center of these results, refers to the outright purchase or sale of a digital asset for immediate settlement, as opposed to futures, options or other derivatives that track an asset's price. Spot volume is the most widely watched measure of activity on platforms such as Gemini because it reflects customers actually exchanging money for crypto.
5. Coinbase and Robinhood saw similar softness
Gemini was not alone in reporting a cooler quarter for crypto trading. Several of its competitors described weaker activity over the same months.
At Coinbase, both retail and institutional activity softened. Consumer spot trading volume on the platform declined 9% from the second quarter to $23.4 billion. Chief Financial Officer Alesia Haas said continued growth in prediction markets had helped make up for the softer crypto trading picture.
Robinhood, the retail brokerage that offers crypto alongside stocks and options, reported crypto revenue of $120 million, a 55% decline from the same quarter a year earlier. Over the same year-on-year comparison, its revenue from event contracts rose sixfold to $173 million, more than offsetting the crypto shortfall in that line of business.
Taken together, the results point to an industry-wide pattern rather than a problem specific to one platform. Individual appetite for spot crypto trading cooled in the third quarter, and the larger platforms increasingly pointed to other products to carry growth.
6. Why exchanges are turning to prediction markets
Prediction markets let users trade contracts tied to the outcome of real-world events, such as an economic data release, an election result or a price level at a certain time. Each contract settles based on whether the event occurs, and its trading price reflects the market's view of the probability. In the United States these products are offered as event contracts on venues regulated by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.
For crypto exchanges, the appeal is straightforward. Event contracts attract users who might not otherwise trade digital assets, and activity in them does not depend on the direction of crypto prices. When spot trading slows, a separate stream of engagement can help steady revenue, which is the role Coinbase and Robinhood described for their own offerings.
Gemini has been building in the same direction through its prediction exchange, Gemini Predictions. The question for the company is whether that business can grow quickly enough to matter alongside its core trading operation.
7. Gemini Predictions grows but remains small
Revenue from Gemini Predictions increased 52% from the second quarter to $796,000. The growth rate is strong, but the dollar amount is small next to the $13.4 million the exchange business generated, and it was not enough to make up for weakness in other parts of the company.
Gemini pointed to momentum after the quarter closed. In October, the average number of daily prediction traders ran about 50% above the third-quarter average, according to the company.
The exchange also said nearly a third of its new prediction traders in October were new to Gemini altogether. That share was more than double the rate recorded in the third quarter, suggesting the product is starting to function as a way to bring in customers rather than only as an additional feature for existing ones.
8. The Apex Fintech Solutions agreement
A distribution deal could widen the reach of Gemini's event contracts. In August, Gemini reached a nonbinding agreement with Apex Fintech Solutions, a provider of brokerage infrastructure.
Under the proposed arrangement, Gemini Titan, the company's regulated derivatives venue, would become the exclusive venue for crypto event contracts that Apex offers through its futures brokerage to its brokerage customers. That would place Gemini's products in front of investors who use brokerages built on Apex's platform, rather than requiring them to open accounts directly with the exchange.
The agreement is not yet final. It remains subject to definitive agreements between the two companies, and its terms could change before any launch.
9. What the results mean for Gemini
The third quarter leaves Gemini balancing two trends. Its institutional business is growing, supported by Zcash activity and expanded market making, but the higher-margin retail business that supplies most of its exchange revenue is contracting.
That tension is not unique to Gemini, as the figures from Coinbase and Robinhood show. Each company described weaker crypto trading among individual users, and each is betting that event contracts can provide a steadier source of activity. For Gemini, the scale of that bet is still modest, with prediction revenue below $1 million for the quarter, but the October user data indicates the company sees early traction.
The quarter-over-quarter framing used in the results is also worth keeping in mind. Comparing one three-month period with the one just before it captures short-term changes in customer behavior, which is why the 14% retail decline and the 26% institutional gain stand out. Robinhood's figures, by contrast, compare the third quarter with the same period a year earlier, a longer window that captures how much the crypto trading environment has shifted over twelve months.
Investors will be watching whether retail activity stabilizes, whether institutional gains continue to translate into revenue, and how fast the prediction business can grow from its small base.
10. What's next: the earnings call
Gemini is scheduled to hold its third-quarter earnings call on Friday, November 13. Management is expected to discuss the trading results, the retail slowdown and the outlook for Gemini Predictions, including the October trends the company has already highlighted.
Progress on the Apex Fintech Solutions agreement is another item to follow. A move from the nonbinding stage to definitive agreements would give Gemini a new distribution channel for its event contracts at a time when the company, like its peers, is looking beyond spot crypto trading for growth.