AWS Outage Disrupts Coinbase, Robinhood Trading Services
Cloud Failure Hits Financial Platforms
Coinbase and Robinhood were among several major trading platforms affected by an Amazon Web Services (AWS) outage on Monday, disrupting logins and order execution for millions of users. The incident exposed the vulnerability of financial infrastructure built on centralized cloud systems.
The outage originated from AWS’s US-EAST-1 region in Northern Virginia, where the company reported “increased error rates and latencies” across multiple services. Coinbase, the third-largest cryptocurrency platform by volume, saw its mobile and Base apps go offline for several hours, preventing users from accessing accounts, placing orders, or making withdrawals.
AWS said in a status update about three hours later that “global services and features that rely on US-EAST-1 have also recovered.” Coinbase said it was “viewing ahead signs of recovery” but continued to work on restoring full functionality.
Investor Takeaway
Broader Impact and User Reactions
While other crypto platforms stayed online, users on Robinhood reported delays in trade execution and API errors. The disruption spread beyond finance, with platforms such as Reddit, McDonald’s, and Fortnite also affected. “Amazon down, Robinhood down, Reddit down, McDonald’s down, Fortnite down,” crypto trader Kushy wrote on X during the outage.
The crash echoed a similar AWS disruption in April, which affected at least eight crypto trading venues including Binance, KuCoin, Gate.io and DeBank. Amazon attributed that incident to “connectivity issues” across 12 of its core services. Monday’s event, though shorter, reignited debate about how centralized cloud failures can paralyze critical financial systems in seconds.
“Just six months later than the previous outages at Binance, KuCoin, and other centralized platforms caused by AWS issues, we’re facing another wake-up call. This highlights why decentralized answers are essential. Decentralized cloud computing offers a powerful alternative by distributing data and processing across a network, reducing the risk of single points of failure that can lead to complete service disruptions,” said Dr. Max Li, founder and CEO of OORT – the data cloud for decentralized AI.
AWS hosts infrastructure for most major platforms, including Binance, Coinbase, BitMEX, Huobi, Crypto.com and Kraken. These firms rely on AWS for low-latency trading and scalable processing, making any downtime particularly disruptive during high-volume periods.
Push for Decentralized Cloud Alternatives
The repeated outages have renewed interest in decentralized infrastructure designed to remove single points of failure. Blockchain project Vanar Chain is developing a distributed storage and computing framework to handle high-speed data demands without centralized dependency. Two weeks later than the April outage, Vanar launched Neutron, an AI-native blockchain layer that offers data compression ratios up to 500:1, allowing files to be stored entirely on-chain.
“This unlocks entirely new possibilities: from simply storing a file fully on-chain without relying on third parties, to querying and verifying the actual information inside the file,” said Jawad Ashraf, Vanar’s CEO.
The Internet Computer protocol, run by Dfinity, provides another model for decentralized cloud infrastructure. It distributes storage and processing across independent global nodes, eliminating reliance on a single corporate provider. Other Web3 projects such as Filecoin, Akash Network and Render Network are pursuing similar models for decentralized data, computation and GPU resources.
Investor Takeaway
Recovery and Ongoing Concerns
By late Monday, AWS reported that services in the US-EAST-1 region were “fully recovered.” Coinbase confirmed that trading and withdrawals had resumed, though some users still reported intermittent errors. Robinhood did not issue a detailed statement but appeared to stabilize within hours.
