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.”

Key takeaways

• LINK rose about 6% while much of the crypto market retreated, extending its reported 30-day gain to 30.3%.
• Chainlink’s CCIP 2.0 launch gives institutions the option to add their own cross-chain transaction verifiers.
• LINK met resistance near $15, while the supplied chart analysis identifies $12-$13 as a potential support zone.

Chainlink’s LINK token outperformed a weaker crypto market following the launch of Cross-Chain Interoperability Protocol (CCIP) 2.0. 

The token gained about 6% in the session described in the supplied analysis, taking its 30-day advance to 30.3% and its year-to-date return into positive territory.

The upgrade gives financial institutions more control over transactions that move data or assets between blockchains. 

Traders appeared to welcome the announcement, though LINK’s approach to $15 brought a technical test after its recent rally.

CCIP 2.0 adds institution-operated verifiers

Cross-chain transfers require a way to confirm that an action occurred on one blockchain before a corresponding action is completed on another. CCIP provides that communication layer. 

With version 2.0, institutions and asset issuers can add Cross-Chain Verifiers to apply their own checks alongside Chainlink’s default verification network. Chainlink says starter kits will let users run those verifiers on infrastructure including Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud.

The added checks could matter to firms with internal security or compliance requirements. An issuer, for example, may want a transfer to proceed only after its own verifier has approved it. 

CCIP 2.0 also offers configurable compliance controls, fees, and execution options, allowing users to choose how a transaction is checked and completed. These features are optional; Chainlink says its existing verification network remains the default.

Speed is another part of the upgrade. CCIP 2.0 supports faster-than-finality transfers where a user’s chosen risk settings permit them. 

Chainlink also says it is working to support Ethereum’s Fast Confirmation Rule when that feature launches. Its future integration should not be treated as a speed improvement already available for every Ethereum transfer.

The supplied market analysis reported an 89% jump in LINK trading volume following the CCIP 2.0 announcement. 

Higher volume shows that more tokens changed hands during the move, but it does not, by itself, show whether buyers will remain in control.

The same analysis cited a recovery in Chainlink’s total value secured from about $43 billion in June to $57 billion in August. That metric describes value associated with assets using Chainlink services; it is distinct from revenue earned by Chainlink or the market value of the LINK token.

The product announcement gives traders a reason to reassess Chainlink’s role in institutional blockchain infrastructure. Even so, a network upgrade does not automatically create immediate demand for LINK. Adoption, usage, and the broader market’s direction will matter to whether the price move lasts.

Can LINK break above $15?

LINK’s advance encountered selling pressure near $15, a level the supplied daily-chart analysis identifies as immediate resistance. 

It also noted a bearish divergence in the relative strength index: price strengthened while the momentum reading weakened. Such a signal can precede a pause or pullback, although it does not establish that one must occur.

If LINK retreats, the analysis places a possible support zone at 12–13. Holding that area could leave the broader recovery intact, while a decisive break below it would weaken the bullish setup.

A sustained move above $15 would shift attention toward higher levels, including the article’s $20 upside scenario. From $12, a rise to $20 would be roughly 67%, but that percentage describes a hypothetical entry and exit, not an expected return. 

For now, the clearest test is whether LINK can absorb selling around $15 while maintaining support if the wider crypto market remains under pressure.

BTC’s move above $80,000 has triggered a “double-bottom breakout,” a technical analysis pattern confirming a bullish trend and opening the door for a rally to $100,000, according to Jurrien Timmer, director of global macro at Fidelity Investments.

“Bitcoin is looking particularly interesting here as it challenges key resistance at $80k. If it breaks it will confirm a double bottom targeting $100K,” Timmer wrote on X on Friday.

A double bottom looks like the letter W on a price chart. The price drops to a low, bounces, falls back to roughly the same level, then rises again. The two dips show buyers stepping in at the same price twice. The peak in the middle of the W acts as resistance. A break above it suggests sellers have run out of steam and a new uptrend may be starting.

Timmer’s chart shows bitcoin’s two lows this year at $60,033 and $57,742, with the middle peak near $82,800.

Chart patterns are not guarantees. Breakouts often fail, reversing quickly and trapping buyers who chased the move.

Still, the bullish setup is consistent with options traders positioning for more gains. The $90,000 call is the most popular bitcoin options bet on crypto exchange Deribit, with $2.45 billion in open interest. The $95,000 call follows with $2.33 billion, and the $100,000 call holds $1.79 billion. A call gives the buyer the right to buy at a set price and profits when the market rises above it.

Bitcoin BTC$84,117.13 recovered Monday’s losses to trade at $84,170 on Tuesday, up 0.82% since midnight UTC and 1.4% over 24 hours, with 72 of the 100 CoinDesk 100 constituents higher and the index adding 0.89% to 1,904.49.

The bid is arriving despite conditions that have been suppressing risk assets for a week, the 10-year Treasury yield sitting at 5.234% after ending Monday above 5.2%, near levels last seen in 2007, and the 30-year at 5.549% having topped 5.56% on Monday, around a 2004 high.

U.S. stocks fell for a second session on Monday, the Dow dropping more than 300 points and the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite shedding 0.8% and 0.9%, with futures mixed on Tuesday morning.

Decentralized finance (DeFi) is driving the move for the second time in a week, with the DeFi Select Index (DFX) gaining 5.0% since midnight, led by lending protocol token aave AAVE$149.48 at 11% and curve dao token CRV$0.3457 at 5.2%. The CoinDesk 80 rose 2.0% against the CoinDesk 5’s 1.3%, though the ranking inverts over 24 hours, where the CD5’s 1.7% beats the CD80’s 0.44%.

The D’CENT wallet hack, the year’s second-largest drain of XRP behind the Bitget crypto exchange hack, has spilled beyond the XRP Ledger onto additional blockchains like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Stellar. 

Hackers have drained more than 12.4 million XRP from more than 7,000 D’CENT wallets, still some way behind Bitget’s loss of 102.9 million XRP.

Although the wallet was popular among the XRP community, D’CENT users who owned assets of other blockchains have also lost their funds.

D’CENT’s own disclosure named Bitcoin, Tron, and Ethereum, for example. Even a Stellar user has lost XLM in the incident.

Hackers are able to sweep funds across blockchains with one compromised recovery phrase for the multi-blockchain wallet.

IoTrust, the maker of D’CENT, confirmed at least 110 abnormal transfer reports, including non-XRP assets, per ZDNet Korea.

XRP holders lose $18 million in D’CENT hack

Drains of XRP are the most well-documented, due to the prominence of D’CENT among XRP holders.

At least six waves of theft occurred between September 15 and 20, emptying 6,678 wallets of 11.7 million XRP.

The thief stole from large wallets first, by hand, and soon wrote scripts to take funds from progressively smaller wallets.

Warnings from D’CENT and other members of the XRP community couldn’t stop the drainage. Thieves took 640,370 additional XRP after September 21, bringing the tally to above 12.4 million.

By Friday, 6.3 million of those stolen XRP had crossed to Ethereum’s blockchain through the swap service THORChain.

As the theft spilled over to other blockchains, researchers admitted the scope of the losses, saying, “Most of it is no longer XRP.”

Market action since 2022 backs Thielen’s take. The 10-year yield more than doubled to 3.88% that year as the Fed raised interest rates rapidly, including several 50- and 75-basis-point hikes to fight inflation.

Bitcoin fell 64% that year. Fed tightening and rising yields added to the pain from crypto scams and blowups.

The picture has been different since. From the end of 2023, the 10-year yield has risen 135 basis points to 5.23%, the highest since 2007. Over the same stretch, bitcoin has roughly doubled to $86,000, even after pulling back from its October record above $126,000.

Thielen and others attribute much of the recent rise in yields to fiscal fears and a higher term premium. In plain English, investors want to be paid more to lock up their money in long-term bonds, given the uncertainty over inflation and government borrowing.

Chicago-based Strategic Analytics made a similar point about gold, noting that it has tracked fiscal risk more closely than the Fed’s policy path since 2022.

“Since 2022, gold has increasingly tracked fiscal-risk perceptions – term premium, deficits, debt sustainability – rather than the Fed’s policy path. Gold is not defying real yields. It is pricing fiscal sustainability and currency debasement, which has become the marginal driver,” it said recently in a LinkedIn post.

Unitree IPO impact

The launch this morning was both imperfect and stripped down to its orbital essentials. On the way up, one of the Starship’s six engines failed to burn properly, requiring the other engines to compensate for the missing thrust to get the ship in orbit. 

In addition, the return to Earth was simplified. SpaceX has made itself famous for safely landing the first stage of its Falcon 9 and Starship boosters—with 641 out of 688 Falcon 9 launches featuring this kind of recovery, allowing the boosters to be reused and make flying cheaper. Starship’s first stage, meantime, performs what has become known as a chopstick recovery, with the booster navigating its way back to the launch tower where two giant metal arms pluck it from the sky. For the current mission, the chopstick recovery was done away with to simplify the flight objectives; instead the first stage made a soft, engine-assisted splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. The Starship spacecraft was planned for a six-orbit, 10-hour mission, with the ship’s engines set to fire around the dinner hour Monday to bring the spacecraft down for a similar gentle, watery landing.