Binance’s token approaches more than one-year low as regulatory pressure mounts

BNB, the cryptocurrency at the heart of the Binance exchange ecosystem, is approaching its lowest price level in more than a year as controversy swirls around the world’s largest digital-asset trading platform.

The token dropped as much as 3.6 per cent to US$203.59 on Tuesday (Aug 22), bringing its loss for the year to around 15 per cent. The decline comes even with crypto bellwether Bitcoin, which accounts for about half the US$1 trillion market’s value, rallying more than 50 per cent since December. BNB has a market capitalisation of around US$32 billion, making it the fourth-largest crypto asset.

BNB holders get trading-fee discounts on Binance, and the token is used to settle fees on BNB Smart Chain, popular with applications such as games and exchanges.

In June, the US Securities and Exchange Commission sued Binance along with its American affiliate Binance.US, alleging “a variety of securities law violations”. While Binance.com, Binance.US and founder Changpeng Zhao have disputed the allegations against them, customers have fled the US platform. The US Commodities Futures Trading Commission filed charges earlier, while Bloomberg News has reported that the US Department of Justice is also investigating Binance.

Since the latest barrage of allegations, the likes of Checkout.com stopped servicing Binance as a payment service provider. Customers at Binance.US have been unable to either deposit or withdraw US dollars after multiple banking partners cut ties with the platform; the company struck a deal with payment startup MoonPay in an attempt to resolve the issue.

Assets held on Binance declined by more than US$310 million in the last 24 hours, to US$57.57 billion, according to tracker DeFi Llama.  

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Binance didn’t immediately return a request for comment on BNB’s drop. BLOOMBERG