The Central Bank of Ireland (@centralbank_ie) has fined the Irish unit of @coinbase €3.25 million after finding that customer money was mixed with funds belonging to customers of other Coinba
The Central Bank of Ireland (@centralbank_ie) has fined the Irish unit of @coinbase €3.25 million after finding that customer money was mixed with funds belonging to customers of other Coinbase companies. The breaches ran from November 2020 to August 2025 under Ireland's Electronic Money Regulations.
Coinbase Ireland is an e-money institution that issues the euro and dollar balances European customers use to buy bitcoin and other crypto assets on the Coinbase platform.The law requires those balances to sit in dedicated safeguarding accounts, separate from corporate money and from customers of other Coinbase entities.
The Central Bank identified three failures, including that Coinbase Ireland placed excessive reliance on its US-based group to design and run its safeguarding controls and lacked the local expertise to oversee that work.Its safeguarding account was also underfunded for lengthy periods because of poor system design and weak control testing.The unit also lacked an adequate process to flag material changes in its safeguarding practices to the regulator.
The regulator first set the penalty at €4,646,597, then applied a 30% settlement discount, bringing it to €3,252,618.Coinbase Ireland has accepted the sanctions, which take effect only after the High Court of Ireland confirms them.
A Coinbase spokesperson said the company self-reported the issues to the Central Bank and that no customers suffered financial loss or were unable to access their funds.The company said it reported several of the calculation and operational errors to Irish regulators in January 2024 and that the underlying historical issues have since been remediated.Coinbase said it has redesigned its safeguarding calculation, passed two third-party validations with no open findings, posted a €25 million guaranty bond and hired a dedicated head of safeguarding.
In November 2025, the Central Bank fined Coinbase Europe Limited €21,464,734 for breaching its anti-money laundering and counter terrorist financing transaction monitoring obligations between 2021 and 2025.The regulator found faults in the firm's monitoring system configuration that left more than 30 million transactions, worth over €176 billion, not properly monitored over a 12-month period.The High Court confirmed those sanctions on 12 January 2026.
Coinbase Europe's Irish registration lapsed at the end of 2025 as the exchange moved its European headquarters to Luxembourg under a MiCA license from the country's financial regulator. Together, the two penalties total nearly €24.7 million, according to FinTelegram.
The latest fine adds to scrutiny of how crypto firms in Europe protect customer funds. For users of $COIN-listed Coinbase, the practical impact will depend on the High Court's confirmation and any further regulatory follow-up.
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