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Comment by g09980 | Hacker News Reader

One of those situations where software bugs may (temporarily) ruin people's lives.

Many threads on this topic from people who had a relatively small amount to their name in their bank accounts, it was linked to Coinbase, and they now can't pay living expenses:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xot6y/freaking_o...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xspus/what_happe...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xs2zr/i_have_bee...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xsyf4/17x_charge...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xrq4k/welp_offic...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xq3xc/you_draine...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xrf02/3x_5x_how_...

https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xrfhs/double_cha...

Many more on that subreddit... and that's just from people who use Reddit.

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Not to judge how people spend their money, but surprising how many people are buying crypto while they only seem to have a few hundred dollars in their bank account. Very risky putting in money it sounds like they can't afford to lose.

If it all comes crashing down at some point (which I don't expect, but is possible) I wonder what the ramifications are if millions of people are depending on whatever they have in their coinbase accounts to pay bills.

There is a difference from risking a few hundred dollars you can maybe afford to lose, and the remainder (unspent) of your bank account being overdrawn.

I'm fairly financially stable but I generally only keep a few hundred dollars in my checking account at any given time. The rest goes into long term savings of one sort or another, and it's not necessarily easy to convert back to petty cash on short notice.

Exactly, most of my extra money is automatically sent to my 401K and my brokerage account. I don't typically have much in my checking account and don't have a savings account because my bank offers a "whopping" 0.05% interest on my savings.

In my experience, landlords charge extra for paying my rent with a credit card, if that's even a possibility at all.

I think some of my utilities also have a surcharge if you use a credit card rather than a bank account. I do get cash back on my main credit card, but the surcharges are generally higher.

Savings accounts have a limit to how often you can withdraw, I think.

the money being lost is not their bitcoin investment but their checking account's balance. It doesn't make sense to me to keep large amounts on money in checking because you don't earn any interest and it takes time to transfer money from savings to checking. So it makes sense to me that some checking accounts are being completely emptied or overdrafted...

Here's one anecdote of $67,000 being removed: https://www.reddit.com/r/CoinBase/comments/7xsyf4/17x_charge...

It also doesn't make sense for you to keep money in a savings account, by the way. The difference in interest is minimal. I don't even bother.

But indeed, quite an annoying bug!

> It also doesn't make sense for you to keep money in a savings account, by the way.

The main point of a savings account is so that other people can't steal your money, like they can if it's in a checking account.

That's why you use a credit card for purchases and pay off that balance immediately with your checking account. US citizens are generally not liable for identity theft or fraud on their credit card[1]. This should keep your checking account safe. With current interest rates no one should have a savings account.

[1]: https://www.creditcards.com/credit-card-news/zero-liability-...

Get a checking account from a credit union instead of feeding banks that don't care about you. I get 1.5% APY on my checking account [1], and there are plenty of similar programs across the country.

https://www.kemba.com/accounts/personal-checking/get-green-r...

> surprising how many people are buying crypto while they only seem to have a few hundred dollars in their bank account

I don't think it is at all. Investing in a better future is a human need. They'd probably buy startup stock if they could, but that's been artificially held back by the SEC's racist regulations.

People should always have multiple accounts and the ones you use for online, including bank accounts and credit cards, should be limited and watched closely.

Only money needed for the next month's transactions should be in there, all other money should be moved to other accounts and investments.

Blows my mind when I hear about people with huge amounts in one single account, or these people doing big > $10k wire transfers. Better to do small chunks and limit exposure on your online accessible accounts to third party services.

Spread risk and money across accounts, banks, investment companies etc. Never have one of any sort that has your whole life in it.

Same goes with crypto, some in exchanges, some in hardware wallets, some in software wallets across multiple services.

100% agreed.

You're still not at fault if you don't do this, and have suffered as a result of this issue. You could have mitigated the impact to yourself by changing your flow / increasing the cost to yourself, but you're still not at fault if you didn't.

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