Ari Paul says Coinbase lost his $25M, covered up $1B in hacks

BlockTower Capital founder Ari Paul has accused Coinbase of losing $25 million of his company’s funds while covering up over $1 billion worth of “massive and repeated hacks.”

Paul claims that at least a dozen firms are affected by the alleged cover-up, and that Coinbase “still wouldn’t return our money.”

He also claims that these major allegations are all he can say at the moment as there are “multiple legal processes still ongoing.”

Read more: Coinbase and Brian Armstrong are threatening to leave California… again

BlockTower Capital is a crypto and traditional asset investment firm founded in 2017 by Paul and Goldman Sachs executive, Matthew Goetz.

Two executives left the company in 2022 and 2023 for mysterious reasons, while the company also shuttered its $100 million Market-Neutral Fund in 2023.

Coinbase claims it isn’t covering up hacks

When asked for comment, Coinbase directed Protos to a support post that claimed the exchange “is not hiding a series of hacks and we certainly didn’t lose $1 bilion.”

It said that it advises customers on security practices like maintaining their API keys, and that like most other firms that offer access via API keys, “we do not retain the information necessary to transact on customer accounts.”

Coinbase refused to comment on specific clients.

Coinbase allegations made against Cobie

Paul was responding to a series of posts shared by Cobie, a prominent crypto investor who became a glorified customer support representative for Coinbase.

Cobie was pointing out to X user “Kuno” that they’d been ignoring the crypto exchange’s attempts to reach out to them. 

Kuno, on the other hand, claimed they repeatedly approached Coinbase over $1.2 million it had allegedly stolen. 

Cobie noted that Kuno was promoting a “shitcoin” and that the whole affair looks like “an entirely fake/scam report/engagement farm.”

Cobie hasn’t responded to Paul’s allegations at the time of writing.

Coinbase sued over $55M draining hack

Coinbase was sued back in May for allegedly withholding a portion of $55 million in crypto that was stolen in a draining hack in August 2024. 

The victim claims he lost his crypto after clicking on a malicious link that spoofed Ethereum DeFi management tool “DefiSaver.”

Read more: Coinbase CEO admits content coins were a mistake

From here, he unknowingly authorized a smart contract permission that supposedly gave the thieves control of his crypto wallets.

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Edit 16:00 UTC, Sept 29: Updated piece to include comment from Coinbase.

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