Gangti Zhu, a Maryland retiree, says he put almost his entire life savings into a Robinhood Markets account this year, only to lose about $300,000 in a hack.

He describes the same painstaking experience that other users have encountered: a panicked search for a phone number, a slew of emails after finding there’s no emergency line and then relief when the money was finally returned to his account.

The key difference, he says, is that Robinhood then took the funds back.

“Our team concluded its investigation and determined that your account was not compromised and that no unauthorized activity took place in your account,” read the Dec. 4 email from a customer support representative named Greg P., seen by Bloomberg. “As a result of our findings, we removed the corrections made by Robinhood.”

“I was traumatized,” said Zhu, 63. “I was left in the dark, hopeless, anxious and had no idea what had happened to my account and what to do next.”

His case is an extreme example of a hacking allegation at Robinhood, the trading app that exploded in popularity this year as Americans stuck at home from the Covid-19 pandemic looked to profit from a gyrating stock market. At a time when regulators are circling and the company is preparing for an initial public offering, the brokerage also is facing mounting customer-service complaints and claims of compromised accounts that can be thorny to resolve.

An internal investigation this year found that hackers hit about 2,000 accounts, Bloomberg reported in October, while advertisements on the dark web suggested thousands more could be at risk. More recently, Robinhood found “fewer than 40” instances of accounts being compromised by malware on user devices, according to a statement to Bloomberg for this story.

Malware can allow hackers to take over their account and make it appear that it was from a trusted device, making it more difficult to track fraud. Robinhood has taken steps with affected customers to help them fix the problem, along with offering a “goodwill credit,” David Favreau, the company’s head of fraud operations, said in the statement.

Zhu’s case is an instance where a claim, once addressed, has been reversed with little explanation. He had poured more than half a million dollars into his account -- a much larger amount than the typical Robinhood user -- and says hackers drained out the roughly $300,000 through options trades, which can be more difficult to identify as fraudulent than a simple removal of funds. He’s filed complaints with the SEC and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

Robinhood, which has more than 13 million users, has promised to fully compensate customers if it determines they lost money because of unauthorized activity. The company said it has referred Zhu’s case to law enforcement.

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