Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev warns: the official has not issued any tokens; everything listed under his name is meme coins

Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev issued a warning to users, stressing that Robinhood has never issued any official cryptocurrency tokens—any coin claiming to be official is just a meme coin or a scam. Earlier, his verified X account was hacked on July 23, and the attacker promoted an impersonated fake meme coin, Vladhood (ticker: VLAD), falsely claiming it was the official mascot of Robinhood Chain and that it would soon be listed on the app. In about two hours, the hackers netted roughly $247k.
(Background: Robinhood CEO account stolen! Meme coin VLAD siphons 650 ETH)
(Additional context: Vlad Tenev discussed Robinhood’s three curves: on-chain finance, retail investing, and AI)

Key summary

• Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev warns users that Robinhood has never issued any official crypto tokens.
• His X account was hacked on July 23, and the attacker promoted the impersonated fake meme coin Vladhood (ticker: VLAD).
• The hackers didn’t do a pump— they made money from posting fees; in two hours they cashed out about $247k.

U.S. brokerage Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev left no room for doubt: the company has never issued any kind of cryptocurrency tokens. The backdrop to this warning is that his own verified X account was compromised on July 23, and was used to advertise a counterfeit meme coin called Vladhood (ticker: VLAD). The post even falsely claimed it was the “official mascot” of Robinhood Chain, and that it was set to be listed on the Robinhood app.

Robinhood’s official account @RobinhoodComms quickly confirmed that the account had been hacked and removed the post. The message was straightforward: any token claiming to be from Robinhood or Vlad Tenev is not officially issued—either a meme coin or a scam. When you see the words “official,” don’t rush to chase it.

$247k in two hours from fees

The hackers didn’t want a pump—they wanted fees. According to on-chain tracking, the funds entered the wallet via a cross-chain bridge through Relay only before the incident, transferring 0.2955 ETH. The attacker used a Pons relay launchpad to put VLAD on-chain; once the fake post was up, trading volume peaked at over $22 million. The attacker then drained the fees in six withdrawals within two hours, totaling about 31.6 ETH (about $59k), plus roughly 72 million VLAD tokens (about $188k). All told, they walked away with about $247k and called it a day. A verified CEO-linked account is the most expensive raw material for this business.

Robinhood Chain, live for three weeks, gets flooded with meme coins

Robinhood Chain is an Ethereum Layer 2 network that only launched its mainnet on July 1, 2026. The official positioning is to carry tokenized stocks and other real-world assets. But since launch, on-chain activity has been almost entirely dominated by speculative meme coins, with scams and rug pulls appearing one after another. This Vladhood fake coin is the third community account scam targeting Robinhood Chain meme coins within three weeks— the first two impersonated the official accounts of SpaceX and Starlink. Same playbook, same boss’s face.

Even more ironic: Vlad Tenev himself said on July 2 to CNBC that meme coins are “a dead end—assets with no utility.” For retail users, the takeaway is actually simple: when you see a coin with an “official” name, it’s smart to treat it as a scam first.

FAQ

Does Robinhood issue its own cryptocurrency token?

No. CEO Vlad Tenev has publicly warned that Robinhood has never issued any official cryptocurrency tokens. Any coins appearing in the market under the names Robinhood or Vlad Tenev are meme coins or scams, not official assets.

What is Vladhood (VLAD)?

It’s a counterfeit meme coin issued on Robinhood Chain. After hacking Vlad Tenev’s X account, the attackers used a fake post to falsely claim it was the official mascot; within two hours they made roughly $247k from fees. At its core, it’s an impersonation scam.

This article references Robinhood’s official announcement and on-chain data, organized and reported by Dongqu Dongqu.