Coinbase Unveils Recovery Tool For Unsupported Assets

Users who have accidentally sent unsupported Ethereum-based tokens to Coinbase may soon be able to recover them.

The exchange’s “ERC-20 self-service asset recovery tool” aims to solve a problem that has long plagued centralized exchanges. When sent to Coinbase, unsupported tokens are effectively trapped, as on-chain transactions are irreversible, leaving users with no way to recover their assets.

“When this happens, the result is that these funds don’t get registered on the Coinbase ledger,” the exchange said in a news release announcing the tool. “Historically, these assets have been unrecoverable, in part because our employees and support channels don’t have access to the private keys needed to reverse these transactions.”

Coinbase claims to reject more than 90% of tokens that apply to be listed on the exchange.

The tool will allow users to send the tokens from the address on which they are trapped to a self-custody crypto wallet without “exposing private keys at any point” or “processing the funds through [Coinbase’s] centralized exchange infrastructure.”

Tokens eligible for recovery include wETH, TUSD and stETH. Not all ERC-20 tokens will be eligible for recovery, however, due to the “technical complexities surrounding the recovery of unsupported assets.”

Coinbase is the second-most popular crypto exchange as measured by web traffic, according to CoinGecko. It claims to be the first exchange to offer such a tool.

To recover trapped tokens, users will need the ID of the blockchain transaction in which they sent the tokens to Coinbase and the receiving address. The service will be free for the recovery of tokens worth less than $100, while a 5% fee will be levied on recoveries larger than $100.