All-Time High

On April 2, binance coin (BNB), the native token for cryptocurrency exchange Binance, set a new all-time high of $356.78, after an impressive rally last week. The rally saw the exchange-backed cryptocurrency soar nearly 43%, after opening the week at just over $250.

BNB is up 47% month-on-month and is the third-largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, which is nearly $52 billion, at press time, behind only bitcoin (BTC) and ethereum (ETH).

Responding to the cryptocurrency’s latest performance, Binance founder and CEO, Changpeng Zhao (CZ), had a seemingly nonchalant response:

“It looks like #BNB made an ATH earlier today before the previous tweet. My bad.”

At press time, BNB is settling around the $340 level, down just under 2% in the last 24 hours.

The CZ Universe

Binance coin was launched in July 2017 by the world’s largest crypto exchange by volume, Binance. Originally an ERC-20 token, BNB later swapped to the BEP-2 standard, after the successful launch of Binance Smart Chain (BSC), the exchange’s blockchain ecosystem.

BNB now powers the BSC ecosystem and the wider Binance universe. Binance users can stake the native currency to earn rewards or participate in exclusive token listings through Binance Laucnhpool. They can also pay trading fees in BNB at a significantly reduced cost.

BNB’s surge value is also reflective of the expansion of Binance’s product and service offering. In recent months, the exchange has launched several applications aimed towards creating a fully established cryptocurrency ecosystem.

These include Binance Pay and Binance Card, both of which allow Binance users to pay merchants or other individuals in crypto.

Moreover, Binance is also increasing its own project development effort in the decentralized finance (DeFi) space, with projects such as Binance DEX, its own decentralized exchange.

Exchange-Coin Season?

Whilst Binance may be the most active in the exchange offering development space, several other exchanges are also on a development spree.

FTX, an up-start crypto exchange run by Sam Bankman-Fried, is making waves in the cryptocurrency industry, after supporting a number of small but promising projects that are pioneering concepts in the DeFi space. Its native token, FTT, has more than quadrupled since the start of the year, according to data from CoinGecko.