Binance Coin (BNB), the native token of the world’s largest crypto exchange Binance, recently hit an all-time high of $725 on June 6, the first week of four months for exchange founder Chagpeng Zhao (CZ). prison sentence in the USA.
According to a Bloomberg report, this Binance Coin price rise made CZ the richest person to ever serve time in a US federal prison. Despite its legal issues, the token’s market capitalization surpassed $109 billion last week, according to data from CoinGecko.
The surge in BNB prices reflects the rise in the stock market?
According to reportBinance Coin’s price trajectory reflects the fortunes of the exchange itself, as the total value of assets on the platform has grown from around $80 billion in early January to $125 billion currently.
This growth has further solidified Binance’s dominance in the cryptocurrency sector despite a rough patch last year that resulted in the company paying out a historic amount. $4.3 billion fine to settle a matter with the American authorities.
BNB holders benefit from discounts on trading fees on the Binance platform. The token is also used for fee settlement on Binance Smart Chain, a blockchain widely used by crypto applications including gaming and exchanges.
The recent rise in the value of BNB was heralded by trading trends in the derivatives market in late May, followed by an increase one-off request in June, with purchases consistently outpacing sales between June 2 and 5, as Kaiko analyst Dessislava Aubert noted.
Although BNB trades on several centralized exchanges, Bloomberg notes that Binance remains the dominant platform, accounting for 85% of BNB trading volume worldwide.
Binance Founder CZ’s Wealth Surpasses $38 Billion
Like before reported, Binance has faced allegations of anti-money laundering (AML) and sanctions violations, including failing to prevent access to the exchange by groups such as Hamas, Al-Qaeda and other activist organizations. Zhao agreed to pay a personal fine of $50 million as part of the settlement.
However, this amount is relatively small compared to Zhao’s estimated net worth of $38.5 billion, a fortune primarily denominated in BNB. Zhao has previously stated that he is a significant shareholder of Binance.
Nicknamed “CZ,” Zhao currently ranks as the 40th richest person in the world, with his net value having increased by $4.1 billion in 2024, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.
Although the extent of Zhao’s BNB holdings remains unknown, a 2017 white paper on BNB’s initial coin offering (ICO) revealed that 80 million tokens, valued today at around $56 billion dollars, were allocated to the founding team.
Overall, despite legal provisions and regulatory challenges Against Binance and its co-founder, the rise in BNB’s value highlights continued interest and confidence in the token and its associated ecosystem.
At the time of writing, BNB was trading at $652, down 4% in the last 24 hours. However, since the start of the year, the token is up 176%.
Featured image of DALL-E, chart by TradingView.com
