By Liam Frost
2 min read
The price of Binance Coin (BNB), the native token of the eponymous crypto exchange, has just broken above $100 for the first time ever, according to crypto metrics platform Messari.
The price of BNB surged above $100. Image: Messari
At press time, BNB has cooled off a bit and is trading at around $97.6, up around 30% on the day.
The latest increase in its price has also pushed BNB’s market capitalization—the combined price of all tokens currently in circulation—to $10.65 billion, making it the 7th largest cryptocurrency.
As Decrypt reported, crypto exchange Binance burns certain amounts of BNB every quarter to reduce its total supply. This subsequently results in the increased scarcity of the coin, and can push its price up.
The latest burn, conducted on January 19, was the largest one so far. That day, Binance destroyed a total of 3,691,888 BNB, which were worth $165.8 million. Today, that would be roughly $370 million.
“Even though this is an impressive amount for a three-year-old startup, at that rate, it would take roughly 27 years to finish the burn. So, we thought it’s time we speed it up a bit,” Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao wrote at the time.
He added that in the future, the scale of burns won’t be based on the exchange's quarterly revenue—like it was before.
Notably, over $200 million worth of USDT stablecoins were transferred to Binance over the last weekend, coinciding with BNB’s 25% price jump at the time.
Decrypt-a-cookie
This website or its third-party tools use cookies. Cookie policy By clicking the accept button, you agree to the use of cookies.