River security record

Licensed in more than 40 US jurisdictions under NMLS 1906809, but not New York

River Financial Inc. publishes a jurisdiction by jurisdiction licence list under NMLS ID 1906809, covering 44 states and territories including the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, and including a Louisiana Virtual Currency Business Activity License. New York does not appear on the list. Read the state disclosures before relying on the licence: Virginia says its money transmitter licence does not cover the transmission of bitcoin, Indiana says its licence does not cover virtual currency transactions, and Tennessee says its licence and the required surety bond do not cover the transmission of virtual currency. Connecticut's disclosure warns that losses from fraudulent or accidental transactions may not be recoverable and that virtual currency transactions are irreversible.

River Licenses and Regulatory Disclosures

August proof of reserves shows 31,581 BTC held against 31,407 BTC owed

The monthly proof published on 2 August 2026 reports 31,581.58549802 BTC of assets against 31,407.79027959 BTC of client liabilities, coverage of about 100.55%. River proves the asset side by broadcasting a small spend from its cold storage address, which anyone can view through a third party block explorer such as mempool.space. It also publishes an anonymised list of client liabilities, so a client can use their account ID to confirm their own balance is included. No independent auditor attests either figure.

River Proof of Reserves

A mining pool failure stopped hashing at both River mining sites for four days

River's status page logged an outage opened on 3 May 2026 caused by a problem at the Foundry pool, which took its Iraan, Texas and Harriman, Tennessee mining sites out of service. River posted updates through the week and marked the incident resolved on 7 May 2026, four days later. It affected mining clients only. Buying, selling and custody were not listed as impacted. It is by far the longest incident in River's published history, where the rest are curtailments of a few hours.

River status page incident history

River launched bank style accounts through Lead Bank, with limited FDIC cover

River launched checking and savings style banking with direct deposit and bill pay, quoting 3.3% APY on cash and no account fees. River states plainly that it is not a bank, that USD is held by Lead Bank, Member FDIC, and that FDIC insurance may protect against a failure by Lead Bank but does not protect against River's own failure and does not cover theft or fraud. Bitcoin is not a deposit, is not FDIC insured, and may lose value. Bill pay is not available to residents of Hawaii, Minnesota and New Jersey.

GlobeNewswire release, River challenges banks that have made billions ripping off Americans

A Google Cloud outage degraded sign ups and downloads for about three hours

River's status page records an incident from 19:14 to 22:32 UTC on 12 June 2025 affecting sign ups and non essential document downloads, caused by a Google Cloud outage upstream. The impact was logged as minor, the only component listed was the website, and River confirmed full restoration the same day. Trading, orders and custody were not listed among the affected components. The rest of River's published incident history is mining site curtailments and utility outages rather than customer facing exchange incidents.

River status page incident history

River published its financial statements, audited by a firm it does not name

River began publishing its financial statements, saying proof of reserves alone does not show the health of the company because it excludes other liabilities. As of 26 August 2026 the financials page carries both 2024 and 2025 documents, and reports a corporate treasury of $68.1 million with no debt at the end of 2025 against $60.9 million a year earlier. River states that it receives a financial audit by an independent accounting firm each year, but the firm is not named on the page. The 2025 document is described as a condensed overview prepared by River, not as an audited statement.

River public financials

River launched proof of reserves over more than $800 million of client bitcoin

River launched a proof of reserves covering more than $800 million of client bitcoin, published monthly. Leishman tied it to the collapse of exchanges such as FTX and called on the rest of the industry to do the same. The asset side is proved by broadcasting a small spend from the cold storage address, which anyone can check on a block explorer. On the liability side River publishes an anonymised list of client balances, so a client can confirm their own balance is included, but no independent auditor attests the totals.

Bitcoin Magazine, River secures over $800 million worth of bitcoin, launches proof of reserve

River says it completed SOC 1 Type II and SOC 2 Type II examinations

Founder and chief executive Alexander Leishman announced on River's own blog that the company had completed SOC 1 Type II and SOC 2 Type II examinations, and framed it as aimed at business and institutional clients holding bitcoin on their balance sheets. River's security page still states SOC II compliance. The reports themselves are not published and the auditing firm is not named anywhere on river.com. A SOC examination tests internal controls over a period. It is not a solvency check and it is not a count of bitcoin reserves.

River security page

Client sued River in federal court over $1.5 million of disputed transactions

James Zou sued River Financial, Inc. in the US District Court for the Southern District of Texas, case 4:23-cv-03130, over roughly $1.5 million of transactions he said were not authorised. This was private litigation, not a regulator action. River moved on 2 November 2023 to compel arbitration under its terms of service and, in the alternative, to dismiss or stay the case. The case was assigned to Judge George C. Hanks Jr and was terminated on 27 November 2023, about three months after it was filed. No published decision came out of it and no court made any finding against River.