Trading term

What is Coinbase premium?

The Coinbase premium is the gap between bitcoin's price on Coinbase, quoted in US dollars, and its price on Binance, quoted in Tether: Coinbase over Binance minus one, usually in basis points. It is read as a gauge of American buying — positive when US buyers pay more than the rest of the world, negative (a 'Coinbase discount') when they pay less.

Coinbase is the venue where American retail and American funds buy bitcoin for dollars; Binance is where most of the rest of the world buys it for Tether. The index compares the two prices at the same moment. Because arbitrageurs sell on whichever venue is dear and buy on whichever is cheap, the gap is what is left after they have taken everything worth taking, so its size is a measure of how cheap and fast the arbitrage is as much as of who is buying. In 2017, when the arbitrage was slow and expensive, the middle 90% of bitcoin's days ran from about −40 to +520 basis points and the gap swung by nearly 2% inside a typical day; by 2026 the middle 90% of days sat between about −16 and +3 basis points and the intraday swing was under 5.

The number the dashboards show is raw: it compares a dollar price with a Tether price, so it includes Tether's own deviation from a dollar. When USDT trades at $1.0004, every Binance price is 4 basis points too low in dollar terms and the premium reads +4 with nobody on Coinbase paying up. Adjust for Tether's price and bitcoin's typical premium in every year since 2020 is one to three basis points, it prints the same median in New York hours as in Asian hours, and the days in its top decile were followed by the same month as the days in its bottom decile.

For example

In the last hour of 17 September 2026 bitcoin closed at $76,348.74 on Coinbase and at 76,417.01 USDT on Binance. The raw premium is 76,348.74 ÷ 76,417.01 − 1 = −8.9 basis points, a 'Coinbase discount'. Coinbase's own USDT-USD market closed that day at $0.99914, so Binance's price in dollars was 76,417.01 × 0.99914 = $76,351.29, and the adjusted premium is 76,348.74 ÷ 76,351.29 − 1 = −0.3 basis points. The discount was Tether.

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Why it matters to you

It is the most-quoted spot number in crypto and it is routinely read as a live signal of US institutional demand. Nine years of hourly data say it is mostly Tether's peg plus a basis point or two of noise, carried across every session by arbitrage, and that a high reading records the rally that already happened. Knowing what the number contains stops you trading a stablecoin's peg as if it were a bid from Wall Street.

⚠ Reading a persistent discount as American selling

Bitcoin's raw Coinbase premium was negative on about five days in six through 2026, a discount of about 6 basis points on the median day. Tether's median price on Coinbase that year was $0.9995. Adjusted for it, the premium was within a basis point of zero. Check USDT-USD before reading any premium against a Tether-quoted venue; the record's deepest 'discount', −567 basis points on 15 October 2018, was the day Tether lost its peg.

Frequently asked questions

What is the Coinbase premium index?

The percentage difference between bitcoin's price on Coinbase (BTC-USD) and on Binance (BTC-USDT), quoted in basis points. Positive means Coinbase is dearer. It is published as a proxy for US buying pressure, on the reasoning that Americans trade on Coinbase and pay in dollars.

Why is the Coinbase premium usually a few basis points?

Because arbitrage closes it. Any gap larger than the cost of selling on one venue and buying on the other is taken within the hour, so what remains is that cost plus Tether's deviation from a dollar. In 2017, with slow and expensive arbitrage, the gap ran to 10% on the widest day; since 2020 the typical adjusted gap has been one to three basis points a year.

Is a high Coinbase premium bullish?

Not in the data. Since 2020, days with the premium in its top decile against the previous 90 days came after a month averaging +15% and before one averaging +4%; the bottom decile came after −1% and before +0.3%. The forward gap changes sign from year to year, and on the premium adjusted for Tether it disappears entirely. A high reading describes the rally behind it.

Read the full guide

DerivativesHow to Read the Coinbase PremiumThe Coinbase premium is bitcoin's price on Coinbase minus its price on Binance, read as a gauge of US buying. Nine years of hourly data say the gap has closed from ±500 basis points to a handful, that most of what remains is Tether's dollar price, that it looks the same in New York hours as in Asian hours, and that it records the month that just happened rather than the one to come.11 min read

Related terms

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