(Bloomberg) -- Binance.US, the American crypto trading affiliate of Binance Holdings Ltd., is seeing an uptick in customer outflows after the US Securities and Exchange Commission filed to seize the platform’s assets, according to a blockchain analytics firm.
New outflows were about $124 million in the 24 hours that ended as of 8:30 a.m. in New York, according to data from researcher Nansen. Binance.US’s customer assets total over $2.2 billion, according to a memorandum from the SEC. Binance.US declined to comment Wednesday on customer outflows.
The agency filed an emergency action application to a court on Tuesday for a temporary restraining order. The regulator also asked the judge to back steps to “ensure that Binance.US customers’ assets are protected and remain in the US through the resolution of the SEC’s pending litigation of this matter.” On Monday, the SEC sued the two platforms along with their founder, Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, accusing the group of commingling assets and allowing the Binance parent to manage and influence parts of the US business from afar, among other charges.
“We’ve noticed a big drop in market depth on Binance.US after the emergency request to freeze assets on the exchange,” said Clara Medalie, director of research at Kaiko. “Market makers are nervous and don’t want to have their assets stuck on an exchange, so are removing liquidity from BTC and ETH order books.”
Separately, Binance.US announced Wednesday that it will delist certain trading pairs, including the stablecoin USDT for the MANA and FLOW tokens, as well as pausing its over-the-counter trading portal. Not all tokens classified as securities by the SEC are being delisted, according to a statement.
In the meantime, the pace of funds leaving Binance overall and at rival Coinbase have slowed since the SEC sued Binance on Monday and Coinbase on Tuesday, according to Nansen. Binance and Coinbase’s respective net outflows were $491.9 million and $105.3 million, the reacher said. Binance saw net outflows of $1.43 billion during the first 24 hours after the SEC sued the exchange.
“We can expect a further drop until a decision is reached on Binance.US’s assets,” Medalie said. “Overall, liquidity is volatile on both Coinbase and Binance in the aftermath of the bombshell lawsuits.”
The lawsuits’ impact on the value of digital assets has been muted given enforcement actions have been largely anticipated by market participants after the Commodity Futures Trading Commission sued Binance in March.
“The result of this will take years to finalize in the courts or sooner if they settle outside,” said Marc Arjoon, a London-based research associate at CoinShares.
Bitcoin, which accounts for about half the crypto market’s value, was down about 1.6% to $26,516. Ether, the second-largest digital asset, fell 1.5%. Binance Coin, the native token of the exchange’s ecosystem, slumped 6.4%, bringing its decline this week to around 16%.
©2023 Bloomberg L.P.
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