CoinDesk Ethics Policy

Last updated December 2024

Editorial independence: In November 2023, CoinDesk was acquired by Bullish, which also owns an eponymous cryptocurrency exchange. Bullish's chairman is Brendan Blumer, who is also the CEO and co-founder of Block.one; both of his companies have interests in a variety of blockchain and crypto businesses and significant holdings of digital assets including bitcoin. (Block.one's portfolio companies are listed here.)

CoinDesk's news team operates independently with an editorial committee to ensure journalistic independence.

Neither Bullish nor any of its executives has any involvement in editorial or content decisions, and our journalists cover the parent company and its affiliates and investments without fear or favor.

Disclosure: In the interest of transparency, all CoinDesk articles automatically include at the bottom a disclosure of our corporate ownership.

Further, any article mentioning Bullish, Block.one or Blumer will include a prominent disclosure in the body text that CoinDesk is owned by Bullish.

Bullish has not disclosed its roster of investors since 2021, and CoinDesk journalists are unaware if the publicly available list is up-to-date.

CoinDesk employees, including journalists, may receive options in Bullish (the parent company, not the exchange) as part of their compensation.

Journalistic standards: We strive for the utmost accuracy, fairness, objectivity and responsible reporting, whether surfacing original news or in reviewing and corroborating information from other sources.

Our journalists know their reporting can affect individual and company reputations, and that they must always be patient and persistent in seeking comment from their subjects. There are usually at least two sides to any story, and CoinDesk will always be diligent in seeking a diverse range of intelligent, sober perspectives.

All factual errors in published articles will be corrected promptly upon discovery, and all corrections and amendments to an article will be disclosed in a note at the bottom. In rare cases where the central idea of an article warrants a correction, the disclosure will be placed at the top and shared on social media, so the correction is broadcast as widely as the original error.

Editors and reporters may never accept payment from any company or individual for coverage or preferential treatment. Journalists are not allowed to accept gifts from companies or individuals CoinDesk covers or is likely to cover. (Exceptions may be made for items of nominal value, such as a T-shirt, hat or coffee mug, or food or beverages that can be consumed within 24 hours.)

Opinion articles, whether written by outside contributors or staff members, are always clearly labeled as such.

As with all reliable media outlets, we do not reveal the identities of sources who speak to us on condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation from the powerful. However, we are also careful about relying on anonymous sources. All stories that originate with an anonymous source require corroboration from at least one other source with firsthand knowledge of the information, and often more, depending on the sensitivity of the story.

Further, we respect the pseudonymity of credible sources who have established reputations in the crypto community under their online handles. We believe prolific software developers and other influential figures who do not give their legal names have reputational skin in the game when they attach their words to their well-known pseudonyms. In many cases, that attachment is sufficient to expect a sufficient degree of accountability. As such, we will not reveal anyone’s identity without his or her consent, unless there is an overwhelming public interest in doing so.

Personal investing: CoinDesk reporters must disclose in their profile pages any cryptocurrency holdings of $1,000 or more; update these disclosures upon any material changes; and, in their articles, mention any potential conflicts of interest. They should avoid such conflicts by minimizing their own coverage of assets or companies in which they have a financial interest. Above all, they may never misuse our platform for personal gain.

Further, trading is forbidden during working hours. Employees are not permitted to short crypto assets or trade futures contracts. Any cryptocurrencies (or stocks) purchased by a CoinDesk journalist must be held for a minimum 30 days.

Company stocks: Our policy on owning stocks is more restrictive than for cryptocurrency, for several reasons.

First, using cryptocurrency and related services is often an important part of researching and understanding the field, while setting up and using a brokerage account is not traditionally involved when reporting on publicly traded companies.

Second, companies have management teams, run from the top down, who have direct control over the direction of the project and can try to influence reporters for favorable coverage. While crypto projects have developer teams and other interested parties, there is no one nominally “in charge” with outsize sway over how the project operates. The absence of direct control means there is not the same degree of conflict as with stocks – not enough to outweigh the educational value of reporters using crypto, and little enough to be mitigated by our disclosure rules outlined above.

Third, a reporter breaking a story, positive or negative, about a publicly traded company sometimes has access to material nonpublic information that, once published, could move the stock price; reporters covering a cryptocurrency are usually working with information in the public domain (on the blockchain, in code repositories or in developer forums). While there are exceptions where non-public information derived from a company involved in the crypto field could move the price of a token, any potential conflict associated with such instances would be mitigated by the disclosure requirements.

All CoinDesk editors and reporters are barred from owning shares in pure-play crypto firms (e.g. Coinbase). Further, beat reporters and their editors who regularly cover diversified companies involved in crypto (e.g. Block, Tesla, MicroStrategy) are not allowed to own shares in those firms.

CoinDesk employees who are found to be not in compliance with these rules may be subject to penalties up to and including termination.

Social media: CoinDesk’s mission is to drive the conversation around the future of money, and social media is one of the best tools to do that. Our official brand accounts are the authoritative editorial voice of CoinDesk. We use social media to share our content and to make announcements about events and new products.

Journalists are encouraged to interact with users of our content through their personal handles. In doing so, they are representing CoinDesk’s brand and values. While they may use their own distinctive voice or express personal opinions, they are expected to conduct themselves professionally. They may not make personal attacks or spread unverified information that could damage an individual’s or company’s reputation.

Use of AI: CoinDesk may occasionally use artificial intelligence (AI) tools to help generate content (text, images, etc.). Our policy is to carefully edit and fact-check such content and to be transparent about this practice to readers through a clear disclosure in the article as well as a dedicated byline that identifies the AI as a creator/contributor of the content. For more on CoinDesk’s use of AI, read this article.

Advertising: One of the ways CoinDesk generates revenue is through online advertising. Aside from maintaining basic standards of quality, CoinDesk does not allow advertising for tokens that are actively seeking investment. For tokens that are outside of a fund raise period, legal documentation must be provided stating that the advertiser's token is regulated by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) or the Commodities Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) in addition to adhering to the guidelines of the Investment Advisor Act of 1940.

CoinDesk articles sometimes include affiliate links, which may generate revenue when readers interact with them and the vendors they link to. When an affiliate link is present in an article, the page will include a written disclosure about the link and its purpose. The presence of affiliate links has no influence on editorial decisions, and members of our commercial team are explicitly forbidden from contacting writers and editors about business relationships.

Events and partnerships: From time to time, CoinDesk may publish sponsored content on our platforms. This content will be explicitly labeled as sponsored, will never be written by CoinDesk journalists or editorial staffers, and will be clearly delineated from our news, analysis, research and opinion articles. Sponsored content relationships will have no impact on the journalism independently produced by CoinDesk’s editorial team.

Likewise, CoinDesk events may include sponsored sessions. These sessions will be clearly billed as sponsored and wholly separate from the vast majority of sessions that are curated by the content team, Sponsor relationships will have no impact on speaking invitations or event programming.

Giveaways/contests: CoinDesk journalists may not accept tokens, coins or any other products or merchandise from giveaways, contests, airdrops or other events that may affect their ability to impartially cover digital assets or the companies behind them.