Five years ago, Gemini Credit Card launched to the market and public, it felt like a crypto company operating under a fintech banner. Today, that credit card is gaining more weight than the exchange itself, and has achieved a remarkable feat of headlining Gemini’s Q1 2026 earnings.
Gemini reported total revenue of $50.3 million for Q1 2026, up 42% year-over-year and marginally ahead of Wall Street's consensus estimate of $47.9 million per FactSet. Transaction revenue held at a steady rate of $24.1 million, which looked strong on the surface, but what most people didn’t know was that those numbers were as a result of two very different businesses moving in opposite directions.
Spot exchange revenue, the original core of Gemini's model fell 27% year-over-year to $17.2 million, with total trading volume collapsing from $13.5 billion in Q1 2025 to just $6.3 billion this quarter. Lower market activity across crypto broadly is part of the explanation, but the trend isn't new. The exchange business is shrinking in relative terms, and Gemini knows it but what is growing fast enough to offset that? Credit cards.
Gemini Credit Card revenue jumped nearly 300% year-over-year to $14.7 million, the single biggest mover in the entire earnings report. New card sign-ups in Q1 alone hit an estimated 13,100, more than double the roughly 6,000 in Q1 2025, bringing cumulative cardholders over the trailing four quarters past 123,700. Managed card receivables more than tripled, from $69 million to $217 million.
The broader services and interest income category which the credit card drives heavily rose 122% to $24.5 million, now representing 49% of total revenue compared to just 31% a year earlier. Gemini is, actually nearly as much a financial services company as it is a crypto exchange. By Q2, that ratio may flip entirely.
And perhaps the most underreported detail of the quarter: on April 29, Gemini received a Derivatives Clearing Organization (DCO) license from the CFTC making it one of only a handful of crypto-native platforms in the US to hold both a Designated Contract Market and a DCO license simultaneously. That combination means Gemini can now handle settlement and clearing entirely in-house for an expanded derivatives suite, crypto futures, options, perpetuals, and prediction markets without using or going through third-party intermediaries.
In the crypto oasis, this isn't a small regulatory feat, rather it is an infrastructure layer that makes a full-stack marketplace sustainable. Strong revenue growth and a major regulatory win give Gemini a credible story on the surface. But the company’s rising expenses complicates the whole story.
Operating expenses jumped 73% to $144.5 million, caused by higher compensation, marketing spend, and costs tied to its credit card business. Gemini also recorded $6.5 million in severance expenses following workforce cuts in Q1.
The company posted an adjusted EBITDA loss of $59.9 million, while net loss improved to $109 million from $149.3 million a year earlier. In simple terms, Gemini is spending heavily to build and expand its business. The big question now is whether its push into credit cards and derivatives will generate enough long-term growth to justify those costs. Analysts currently expect full-year revenue to reach $240.4 million, a target that will likely require Gemini to sustain, and possibly accelerate, the performance it delivered this quarter.