Coinbase CEO calls out “risky business practices” in FTX saga, sympathizes with those involved
Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong posted on Twitter on November 8th, creating a thread that began by sharing “my sympathies with everyone involved in the current situation at FTX.” Armstrong shared that it can be “stressful” when client assets are at risk.
However, Coinbase’s CEO has confirmed that the community understands the differences between Coinbase and FTX, saying that Coinbase does not have “significant exposure” to either FTX or Alameda Research.
2/ Second, Coinbase has no material exposure to FTX or FTT (and no exposure to Alameda).
— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) November 8, 2022
Be strong statementArmstrong argued,
“This event appears to be the result of conflicts of interest between deeply intertwined entities and risky business practices, including misuse of customer funds (loaning of user assets).”
FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried previously claimed in a now-deleted Twitter thread that customer assets were not at risk. However, after the potential acquisition of Binance was announced, he admitted that FTX has a “backlog” of customer withdrawals that needs Binance’s help to clear.
Armstrong explained that Coinbase is registered and listed in the United States because “we believe transparency and trust are very important.” Additionally, as a publicly traded company, Coinbase is required to publish financial data in accordance with his SEC regulations, while FTX, a privately held company, is not.
6/ We believe transparency and trust are very important, which is why we are incorporated in the US and listed in the US. All investors and clients have access to our audited public financials showing how we hold our clients’ funds. Never issued exchange tokens.
— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) November 8, 2022
Armstrong also took the opportunity to oppose the increase regulationproposed by the SBF while defining areas where the crypto industry can “compromise”.
Armstrong argued that Coinbase will continue to “work with policymakers to create sensible regulations for centralized exchanges.” However, he also said he didn’t believe there was a “level playing field” up until this point.
10/ We must continue to work with policymakers to create sensible regulations for centralized exchanges/custodians in each market (as we have been doing for some time). ). We happened to date.
— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) November 8, 2022
coinbase CEO advocated For the growth of non-custodial solutions.
“DeFi and self-managed wallets that do not rely on trusted third parties. Instead, you can trust the code/mathematics and everything will be publicly auditable on-chain.”
Armstrong ended the Twitter thread with a link to Coinbase’s transparency efforts.
