INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
Coinbase features pages offering tips on investing in tokens.London/Washington: Coinbase Global has removed 'how to buy' instructions for at
least three crypto tokens which have been the subject of 'rug pull' warnings that investors may lose their money, saying on Thursday it
website after they were brought to its attention this week by Reuters
There would also be an upgrade in safeguards on its auto-created webpages, she said.Nasdaq-listed Coinbase features pages offering tips on
investing in tokens and the pages in question were informational rather than making them available to trade on its app or wallet.Sales said
the pages, which contained a disclaimer that the information was not investment advice and that the exchange was not liable for "errors and
delays", were created automatically from information carried by data website CoinMarketCap.CoinMarketCap said it was not aware of the
Coinbase pages and its vice-president of growth and operations Shaun Heng said there was not a partnership with Coinbase.Sales said it was
not clear whether Coinbase ran checks on the coins whose information pages it removed
Coinbase would "build a more robust disclaimer for the pages which are being auto-created," the exchange told Reuters on Thursday via
email.Coinbase would also "build a process to take down any other pages which CoinMarketCap has flagged as potentially being scams," it
said, adding that "assets which relate to known scams were not tradeable on the exchange".'RUG PULLS'One page removed by Coinbase featured
DeFi100 and told users to check CoinMarketCap to find out where it could be bought.However, the DeFi100 page on CoinMarketCap warns: "We
have received multiple reports that this project has exited as a scam
Please exercise caution."CoinMarketCap, which does not sell cryptocurrencies on its site, says DeFi100's tokens have not recorded any
daily trading volumes since November 14.DeFi100's website and Medium blog are offline
Its last tweet was in May last year.CoinMarketCap did not respond to requests for comment on DeFi100 or its warning.Twitter users alleged in
May that DeFi100 had performed a "rug pull", where investors deposit money in phoney projects before a coin's developers make off with the
funds.DeFi100 denied the allegations in one of its last tweets, on May 23
Acknowledging investors had suffered losses, it said it hoped to "bring the project back on its feet".It did not respond to Reuters requests
for comment.'MERCENARY'Coinbase also took down a page featuring a token called Mercenary which, like DeFi100, was not available on
Coinbase's app or wallet.Mercenary launched in January, hitting a high of almost $20
But on January 26 it fell within minutes from just over $8 to a fraction of a cent and its price has not since recovered, CoinMarketCap data
shows.Blockchain security firm PeckShield tweeted on January 26 that Mercenary had been hit by a rug pull and warned buyers off it.Reuters
could not contact Mercenary, while its website and Twitter page are both offline.It is unclear when Coinbase launched its page on Mercenary,
which archived webpages show CoinMarketCap first featured on Jan
CoinMarketCap did not respond to a question on whether it had taken Mercenary off its system.Coinbase has also taken down a page on a token
named after Squid Game which crashed to almost zero in November in what cyber security experts said was another rug pull
It also was not available on Coinbase's app or wallet.The website and Medium account behind the SQUID token were quickly taken offline
after the project unravelled and remain down
Twitter also suspended the project's account, saying that it violated the network's rules.The developers behind SQUID said on Telegram
in November that they were abandoning the token, saying "someone is trying to hack our project".(Except for the headline, this story has not
been edited by TheIndianSubcontinent staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)
