Crypto Exchange Accounts: Claiming a Balance After Death

Every article about crypto inheritance says the same comforting thing: not your keys, not your coins. That advice protects self-custody holdings, and it is exactly backwards for exchange balances. Funds sitting on a major exchange are not lost because the seed phrase died with the owner. They are lost because nobody knows the account exists, or because the person who does know cannot satisfy the platform. Start with the crypto inheritance checklist to establish what is actually held and where.

Why the balance is claimable but the account is not

An exchange account is a contractual relationship, and exchange terms almost universally describe it as personal and non-transferable. What the platform owes the user is a balance, and that balance is an asset of the estate. This split explains the behaviour that frustrates families: support refuses to reset the password and email, then asks for probate documents to release the money. The two requests are not contradictory. One concerns identity of the account holder, the other concerns ownership of a debt. A related distinction applies across other digital services and is set out in licensed versus owned digital assets.

Three platforms, three doors

• Coinbase — A dedicated deceased account holder process routed through support. Expect a death certificate, proof of authority over the estate, government photo identification for the claimant and a completed estate form. Funds are released to a verified bank account belonging to the estate or the beneficiary.
• Kraken — An estate claim handled by the compliance team, normally requiring letters of administration or equivalent, a death certificate and identity verification of the representative. Kraken generally liquidates to fiat or transfers to an address the estate controls, decided case by case.
• Binance — A deceased user process that runs through customer support with an inheritance claim packet. Requirements are heavier and the review is slower; additional notarisation or apostille of foreign documents is common where the estate and the account are in different jurisdictions.

The documents that decide the timeline

• Death certificate — A certified copy, not a scanned family copy. For foreign deaths some platforms also want an apostille or a consular legalisation stamp, which can add two to four weeks on its own.
• Proof of authority over the estate — Letters of administration, probate or a grant of representation naming the person entitled to collect the assets. An affidavit from the next of kin is sometimes accepted for small balances, and rarely for large ones.
• Claimant identity documents — Government photo identification plus proof of address matching the name on the authority document. A name mismatch, including a married name, is one of the most common causes of delay.
• Account evidence — Registered email or phone number, approximate balances and any statement, transaction confirmation or tax form that ties the deceased to the account. Even a 2019 confirmation email helps.

Two-factor authentication is the first obstacle

Before any paperwork is useful, the account has to be identified. Exchanges verify by possession: the registered email, the registered phone and the authenticator app. If the phone line has been cancelled, the email is inaccessible and the authenticator lived on a locked device, support cannot simply look the family up. Recovering the master email account therefore comes first, and it is usually the single step that unlocks everything else. The sequencing problem is covered in phone number and two-factor codes after death and in the email account inheritance guide.

Market movements do not pause for probate

An estate claim takes weeks, and exchange balances are volatile. Two decisions follow. First, decide early whether the estate wants to be paid out in fiat or in coins, because platforms ask and the answer shapes the paperwork. Second, watch the tax position. In the United States, digital assets are generally treated as property, meaning the estate takes a stepped-up basis at the date of death and any gain after that date is taxable to the estate or the beneficiary, reported to the IRS. Rules differ in other countries and change over time, so confirm the current treatment with a tax adviser before selling.

What the family should do first

• Step 1: find every exchange — Search bank statements, cards, email for signup or deposit confirmations, and password managers for exchange entries. Many people hold accounts on three or four platforms they rarely mention.
• Step 2: secure the recovery channels — Keep the registered phone line active and regain access to the registered email before cancelling anything. Preserve the device holding the authenticator app, if only temporarily.
• Step 3: establish who has authority — Confirm whether the estate is under probate, who the personal representative is, and whether a small-balance affidavit route exists. This determines which documents the exchange will accept.
• Step 4: submit one complete claim per platform — Contact the bereavement or estate channel with certified documents and the account identifiers. Incomplete submissions are the main reason claims stall, and each round trip costs days.
• Step 5: record the outcome and the tax form — Keep the payout confirmation, any capital gains statement and the correspondence. The estate will need them for tax reporting and for distributing the residual value to beneficiaries.

Prevention beats recovery

The claim route is a fallback, not a plan. Platforms increasingly let users name a beneficiary or an emergency contact, and doing so shortens the process without transferring control while the owner is alive. Record every exchange, the registered email and phone, whether two-factor authentication is on, and where the recovery codes are kept, without writing the credentials themselves in the same place. A vault the estate can open through a check-in process, rather than a note in a drawer, is the difference between a claim that starts in week one and one that never starts at all. TimeWill is a digital legacy vault that keeps that account inventory, the recovery notes and the release instructions encrypted, and hands them to a trusted contact when check-ins stop.

Disclaimer

This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Exchange procedures, document requirements and the tax treatment of digital assets differ by jurisdiction and change frequently. Confirm the current rules with a qualified professional and the platform own published process before relying on anything here.