Coinbase, Binance and Other Crypto See Outages as Prices Plummet

Coinbase went offline for many of its users on Wednesday. SOPA Images / Contributor

As NFT sales slow after months of profit, crypto enthusiasts have had plenty of reason to sweat, and this morning, Coinbase gave them yet another.

CNBC reports that the crypto-exchange company went offline for many of its users on Wednesday as digital coin prices continued to tank.

While the site and app resumed service within an hour, users who wanted to buy during the crypto plunge were quick to notice, taking to social media to complain about the technical problems, according to CNBC.

“We’ve put a fix in place and are monitoring the results,” the company said in a tweeted statement, “however, you shouldn’t run into any more trouble logging into Coinbase and Coinbase Pro. We sincerely apologize for any trouble caused by this issue, and we thank you for your patience with us today.”

Coinbase isn’t the only cryptocurrency exchange to experience problems in the wake of the Great Bitcoin Crash of 2021. Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, also reportedly experienced an outage this morning as crypto stocks continue to plummet, leading the company to announce temporary halts on ethereum and ERC-20 withdrawals and temporarily suspend trading for all Binance Leveraged Tokens. Yahoo! Finance reports that other smaller cryptocurrency exchanges, such as Poloniex, also reported issues with Ethereum and ERC-20 withdrawals. 

The upheaval comes following Elon Musk’s U-turn on Tesla bitcoin, claiming that it no longer aligns with his company’s mission to “accelerate the world’s transition to sustainable energy.” Last Wednesday, the billionaire tweeted that “Tesla has suspended vehicle purchases using Bitcoin. We are concerned about rapidly increasing use of fossil fuels for Bitcoin mining and transactions, especially coal, which has the worst emissions of any fuel.”

“Cryptocurrency is a good idea on many levels and we believe it has a promising future,” Musk added in the statement, “but this cannot come at great cost to the environment.”