Retail users in Vietnam who trade on offshore crypto exchanges like Binance or OKX face heavy penalties. Network School controversy in Malaysia over Israeli citizen ban. Vietnam will fine retail crypto users up to $1900 if they trade on unlicensed overseas platforms such as Binance, OKX and Bybit, instead of on licensed local exchanges. There’s just one problem: Vietnam’s Finance Ministry has yet to issue any exchange licenses for its regulated digital asset market which is due to start on September 1. Five exchanges have been approved in principle however. Domestic investors who trade crypto that’s been designated exclusively for foreign investors can be fined up to $3800. Crypto companies providing or advertising services without a license, those who fail to properly ID customers, or unlawfully deal with crypto account data, can be fined up to $7600. Balaji Srinivasan’s utopian Network School in Forest City, Malaysia is under fire over allegations it has been hosting Israeli citizens using second passports....
Coinbase vice chair Ryan VanGrack said that Democratic lawmakers had added provisions on customer protection to a digital asset market structure bill under consideration in the US Senate. As lawmakers in the US Senate are likely to vote soon on the Digital Asset Market Clarity (CLARITY) Act, representatives from advocacy organizations and companies are providing details of closed-door negotiations over the bill, which is expected to be the most comprehensive piece of legislation affecting the crypto industry. In a Monday CNBC interview, Coinbase vice chair Ryan VanGrack said while the final negotiations over text of the CLARITY Act were taking place in the Senate, Democratic lawmakers had added additional protections for customers to give what he called “more teeth” to the legislation. He did not explicitly mention any progress on adding ethics provisions to the bill, which many Democrats said will be necessary for their votes. “[A]t the end of the day, this is about customer protections,” said VanGrack. “Th...
Coinbase’s Rob Witoff said the company is leaning more on AI to help with execution, but still needs high-agency humans for judgment and strategy. Artificial intelligence now helps write more than 95% of Coinbase’s code, offering new insight into the crypto exchange’s AI strategy following its decision to cut 14% of its workforce earlier this year. Coinbase cut 700 staff in May. In an email to employees, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong said AI has “dramatically” changed the pace of work and there was a need to “return to the speed and focus of our startup founding, with AI at our core.” “Effectively, 100% of our employees are using AI on a daily basis here,” Coinbase’s head of platform, Rob Witoff, told Cointelegraph. “And close to 100% of our code, probably somewhere between 95% and 100%, is written by or with LLMs today.” Read more
The soon-to-be former chief legal officer did not announce the details of his next move but said that he would continue working with the Board of Coinbase National Trust Company. Paul Grewal, who has served as Coinbase’s chief legal officer since 2020, announced that he would transition to an advisory role at the exchange starting on July 31. In a Thursday X thread and LinkedIn post, Grewal said Coinbase’s legal vice presidents Molly Abraham and Ryan VanGrack would step into new roles as general counsel and vice chair, respectively, following his departure at the end of the month. Abraham said that she would “take the helm” at the exchange’s legal team. Source: Paul Grewal Read more
Coinbase said its UK investment services authorization will allow institutional and advanced traders to access derivatives, while retail users will be able to trade equities. Coinbase announced it secured a United Kingdom investment services license, allowing the platform to expand its local offering beyond spot trading and into products like equities and derivatives. On Tuesday, Coinbase said the authorization would enable UK users to trade financial instruments alongside crypto on its platform. Institutional and advanced traders would gain access to perpetual futures tied to crypto, equities and commodities, while retail would be able to access equities. The company said the approval marks its largest UK product expansion since entering the market and advances its vision of an “everything exchange” that combines crypto and traditional financial assets under a single platform. Coinbase said future rollouts would remain subject to regulatory permissions and UK market rules. Read more
Spiko integrated Coinbase Payments into two EU regulated UCITS Treasury funds, enabling USDC and EURC subscriptions and redemption payments through Base. Investment firm Spiko has integrated Coinbase’s stablecoin payment infrastructure into two regulated EU Treasury-bill funds, allowing eligible investors to fund subscriptions and receive redemption proceeds using USDC and EURC. Coinbase said Tuesday the integration covers Spiko’s EU T-Bills Money Market Fund and US T-Bills Money Market Fund. Both are structured as Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities, or UCITS. Coinbase Payments will provide the payment, wallet and application programming interface (API) infrastructure, with the transactions settling on Base, Coinbase’s layer-2 network. The exchange said the products are the first UCITS funds in Europe to accept direct stablecoin payments. Read more
Several exchanges that have already been authorized by EU regulators are attempting to bring in users from companies unlicensed under the Markets in Crypto-Assets rules, offering transfer bonuses and prizes. Cryptocurrency exchanges already approved to operate in European Union member states under the soon-to-be enforced Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework are incentivizing users from companies that failed to gain license approval. With MiCA restrictions set to be enforced starting on July 1, executives of cryptocurrency exchanges including Coinbase and OKX have taken to social media to sway users from soon-to-be unauthorized companies, like Binance and Bybit Global. The world’s largest crypto exchange, Binance, said that it would restrict services for EU-based users after withdrawing its MiCA application last week. Bybit Global on Monday said access to services for users in the European Economic Area “will be progressively limited” starting on July 1, though its Bybit EU arm is authorized to operate u...
Coinbase and Circle have posted steeper losses than Oracle, Netflix and Salesforce, highlighting the widening gap between crypto equities and the broader market. A broad selloff in technology stocks has weighed even more heavily on crypto-focused companies, highlighting a growing divergence between digital asset equities and the broader US stock market. Shares of Coinbase (COIN) and Circle (CRCL) have fallen 69% and 72%, respectively, from their all-time highs. Those declines exceed the drawdowns seen in several major technology companies, including Oracle (ORCL), Salesforce (CRM), Netflix (NFLX) and Palantir (PLTR), which are down between 48% and 57% from their peaks, according to data from The Kobeissi Letter. By comparison, the large-cap S&P 500 Index has retreated just 3.5% from its recent high. Read more
Coinbase for Agents will allow users of the crypto exchange to manage their holdings without "constant manual oversight,” autonomously performing a range of tasks. Crypto exchange Coinbase has launched a tool that allows artificial intelligence agents to make payments and trade crypto on behalf of users, as crypto companies look to ride a wave of interest in AI. Coinbase said Thursday that it is launching Coinbase for Agents, which will allow AI models like ChatGPT and Claude to connect with a user’s exchange account and be prompted to make trades or execute strategies. AI agents can also make payments using Coinbase’s AI payments protocol x402, allowing the bots to pay for data services to gather information for carrying out trading strategies without human intervention. Read more
Bernstein says the 2026 FIFA World Cup could inject billions into prediction markets, with Coinbase and Robinhood positioned to capture a wave of new users. The 2026 FIFA World Cup could mark a breakout moment for prediction markets, with Coinbase emerging as one of the biggest winners, according to a new research report from Bernstein. Published Thursday, the Bernstein analysts estimate the expanded tournament will generate more than $3 billion in incremental sports betting handle and $5 billion to $10 billion in additional consumer prediction market volume, as 104 matches transform what is typically the slowest period for online sports betting. FIFA expects the month-long tournament to attract roughly 6 billion viewers worldwide, up from an estimated 5 billion during the 2022 World Cup in Qatar. Matches are scheduled to start today. Read more
MassPay taps Coinbase to add USDC-powered cross-border payouts, betting stablecoin rails will cut costs and speed up settlement for businesses paying globally. Cross-border payout platform MassPay and Coinbase announced a partnership on Thursday to offer stablecoin cross-border payouts. The partnership connects MassPay's network in 180 countries with the US-based exchange's crypto infrastructure, allowing customers to move between fiat, USDC and other digital assets, the companies said in a joint statement shared with Cointelegraph. MassPay CEO Ran Grushkowsky told Cointelegraph that stablecoins are still a small slice of the company's transaction volume. Still, the company expects the new rails to support nine-figure payouts in the first year. Read more