Robinhood Markets, Inc. (HOOD) is settling into its next growth phase with a clear message: stay lean, think long-term, and let prediction markets do the heavy lifting. The company's new CFO is bringing a familiar playbook of budget discipline and performance tracking, while the platform's event-based trading features are pulling old users back from the dead.

What Wall Street Is Saying

Needham analyst John Todaro reiterated his Buy rating on Robinhood with a $145 price forecast after meeting with the company's new CFO, Shiv Verma, and investor relations executives Chris Koegel, Jack Riehemann, and Matt Greco at a New York luncheon on December 4, 2025.

Todaro came away convinced that Verma is taking a page from former CFO Jason Warnick's approach—tight budgeting, methodical financial planning, and careful performance tracking across the business. Verma told investors his two core goals are growing earnings per share and free cash flow per share, which is about as disciplined as it gets.

The company plans to keep headcount lean and deploy AI tools aggressively to support product expansion without ballooning the workforce. Management described its hiring philosophy as "strategic and limited," backed by internal tools designed to boost productivity rather than team size.

And investor interest? It's heating up. Total inbound interest has doubled compared to earlier this year, while engagement from Asian firms is up fivefold and European firms have tripled their inquiries. Long-only investors now represent about half of all inquiries to the investor relations team, according to Todaro.

Prediction Markets Taking Center Stage

Prediction markets dominated the luncheon conversation, and Robinhood made it clear it's comfortable with increased regulatory scrutiny. In fact, management argued that tighter rules will ultimately strengthen its competitive moat in the category.

Executives expect either Congress or the Supreme Court to issue formal guidance eventually. For now, the product remains unavailable in Nevada and Maryland, and Robinhood has requested an injunction in Connecticut to clear a path for operations there. Most pushback is coming from state regulators, and nearly all of it centers on sports-related contracts.

Sports contracts still drive the bulk of trading volumes, but the platform has historically seen heavy activity around major political and macroeconomic events—think U.S. presidential elections and Federal Reserve policy decisions. The customer base spans a broad range of cohorts, with notable overlap among users who trade crypto, equities, options, and event contracts.

Here's the interesting part: a meaningful minority of users represent reactivated accounts. These are people who came back to the platform specifically to trade event markets. Prediction markets are literally bringing dormant users back to life.

The new joint venture supporting prediction markets gives Robinhood greater control over listings, pricing, and long-term liquidity partnerships. Management expects to become more vertically integrated across the category and, over time, less dependent on external partners.

Executives argued that the long-term winners in prediction markets will be platforms with the strongest liquidity and distribution, while event listings and exchange execution will eventually become commoditized.

Tokenization and Crypto Still in Focus

Tokenization and broader crypto initiatives remain firmly on Robinhood's radar despite the downturn in digital asset prices. Management expects Bitstamp's institution-oriented customer base to generate more stable volumes even in a soft market, while retail activity on Robinhood's own crypto platform may pull back.

Executives highlighted growing customer demand for 24/7 trading—an advantage enabled by tokenization—and said they plan to launch more tokenized equities before expanding into additional asset classes.

HOOD Price Action: Robinhood Markets shares were down 3.73% at $131.97 at the time of publication on Friday.