"International expansion is a big priority for us," Coinbase (NASDAQ:COIN) Co-Founder and CEO Brian Armstrong said during the company's fourth-quarter earnings call Thursday. "We’re continuing to invest in our suite of products," Armstrong added. The company expects to spend $4.25B-5.25B this year on technology and development and G&A expenses, excluding stock-based compensation, up from just $1.41B in 2021. Management said expenses will be driven by plans to hire 6K employees in 2022 as part of its investments in global expansion/scaling efforts. Sales and marketing expenses as a percentage of revenue is also expected to grow. Meanwhile, the heavy expense outlook in 2022 "without visibility on potential ROI is likely to add pressure on the stock near term," Oppenheimer analyst Owen Lau (Outperform) wrote in a note to clients Thursday. BTIG analyst Mark Palmer, who reiterated COIN with a Buy rating, grappled to understand "why COIN shares are trading at just 5.2x FY24
