'Rug Pull' Warnings: Coinbase Removes 'How To Buy' Links For 3 Crypto Tokens

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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 plans to improve safeguards. 

Jaclyn Sales, a spokesperson for Coinbase, said the links were removed from the cryptocurrency exchange's 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