Binance Now Operating in Uganda, Successfully Completes 5th BNB Quarterly Burn

Few people would have been able to predict the immense success of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by daily volume, or how Changpeng Zhao, the CEO and founder of the exchange, would rise to become one of the cryptocurrency world’s most revered and respected figures.

The exchange has had quite the year, and doesn’t appear to be slowing down whatsoever.

Binance Expands to Africa

In 2017, many believed that Binance, based in Hong Kong at the time, would not survive the fact that China instituted a crackdown on cryptocurrencies and ICOs in general.

However, Zhao adapted to the market swiftly, choosing to moving its headquarters and servers to Tokyo. It also chose to expand aggressively in Singapore and Taiwan, and even Malta.

The company has been keen on expanding specifically to countries whose laws are much more welcoming to cryptocurrency in general, and many argue that this adaptability has helped Binance’s global rise to prominence.

Binance’s international expansion now continues now as the company sets foot in Uganda, a plan first announced in June 2018. The company is also providing traders with a month of trading with zero fees in order to encourage users to sign up on the platform.

Users can currently only sign up for accounts, but Uganda Shillings (UGX), BTC, ETC, and LTC deposits will be accepted starting 10:00 AM October 17, local Ugandan time. The first official trading pairs will be BTC/UGX and ETH/UGX.

This new expansion aligns with Binance’s vision of bringing cryptocurrency to the masses, and an overall branding of the company as a global ambassador for cryptocurrency.

BNB Quarterly Burn Completed

One of the most attractive aspects of Binance’s whitepaper, when it was released in 2017, was the fact that the company was willing to institute a quarterly buyback policy through its profits.

Zhao celebrated the company’s 5th quarterly burn in a concise tweet:

Burn completed. Fastest way to spend money. https://t.co/JcWekT1bHf — CZ Binance (@cz_binance) October 17, 2018

Binance did not have its most profitable quarter, as it ended up burning 1,643,986 BNB tokens, which equals about US$17 million. This indicates that the company had a profit of about $85 million this quarter, which means that its profits have taken almost a 50% hit.

For context, Binance burned BNB tokens that were equivalent to about $32 million last quarter. This drop in revenue is not shocking, considering that the entire cryptocurrency market is experiencing a bearish phase, although it’s clear that Binance is still raking in profits.

Improving Transparency

Binance also made important moves regarding transparency this quarter.

They experienced controversy surrounding their listing fees when Christopher Franko, Expanse co-founder, alleged that the exchange would only list his project if he paid an exorbitant fee of 400 BTC.

Binance responded by announcing that they are now donating listing fees to charity. In addition, the exchange recently partnered with cryptocurrency compliance startup Chainalysis, in an obvious attempt to appeal to global regulators and remain as transparent as possible.

The exchange was transparent about the fact that there was less volume this quarter in a Medium post. The BNB token has been quite resilient in terms of market capitalization and price, currently hovering at 1.3 billion dollars and $9.93 respectively.