Complaints to the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau about bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are increasing as the prices of both are on the rise. As of August of this year there have been 227 complaints about virtual currency to the CFPB — a fairly notable pick-up from the seven in 2016.
And that number may, in fact, be too low when it comes to complaints from consumers — it fails to account for the 288 complaints lodged against Coinbase, the leading bitcoin wallet.
It’s a big pick-up — but not a terribly large net number of complaints. All in all, the CFPB has received nearly 150 thousand complaint across various areas of financial services so far. Still, the increase is notable — particularly as it is correlated to bitcoin’s 386 percent price surge this year.
The CFPB has said that consumers should be aware of potential issues with virtual currencies such as unclear costs, volatile exchange rates and hacking threats. The CFPB has also noted that bitcoin companies generally do not offer help or refunds in the event of lost or stolen funds.
It has not, however, taken any enforcement action.
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