In spite of its youth, Binance, a Malta-registered crypto exchange, has rapidly established itself as one at the industry’s finest multi-faceted startups. Case in point, according to statements made by Binance’s chief executive, industry golden child Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, the flagship exchange sports ten million users.
While this is a jaw-dropping accomplishment in and of itself, the company unveiled plans to launch a decentralized exchange (DEX) in 2018, as CZ touted the merits of non-intermediated transactions.
Crypto Insider Changpeng Zhao Speaks On Binance’s DEX
Little was known about the project until August 2018, when Zhao released a “casual, rough, and pre-alpha” sneak peek of the platform, which had no graphical user interface (GUI) to speak of at the time. Since that fateful date in August, the Chinese technology entrepreneur has kept the pedal to the metal, releasing a stream of videos, pictures, and statements about this nascent facet of Binance’s operations.
This came to a head earlier this week, as CZ took to his Twitter page, which has command of the eyes and ears of 275,000 strong, to claim that as Lunar New Year celebrations have occurred, the Binance DEX team “continue to BUIDL.” Hinting that the release of the platform is near, Zhao added that not only was a testnet of Binance Chain — the DEX’s home field, so to speak — pushed to select partners, but integration with Ledger Nano hardware wallets is right around the corner.
Released in tandem with this comment was an image of the yet-to-be-released Binance Block Explorer, clad in the defined, well-recognized, and yellow-tinted design that has become the upstart’s calling card.
While it is a holiday for some, our @binance_dex team continue to #BUIDL, and have released a new version of Binance Chain testnet to our partners, with @LedgerHQ support, along with docs (very draft). It is semi-publicly accessible, if you know where. Onwards! pic.twitter.com/KJoKXmbcUE
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) February 6, 2019
Zhao went on to divulge more about his latest venture in a Q&A livestream. He explained that Binance Chain will utilize the Delegated Proof of Stake (DPOS) consensus mechanism, while BNB will act as the network’s gas, just as ETH is for Ethereum.
Binance’s fervent leader even quipped that due to the barebones nature of Binance Chain — lack of a virtual machine means no smart contracts — the network should be able to generate one-second blocks, each of which pertains to “a couple thousand” transactions. Although Vitalik Buterin would argue that such high data throughput is bull, CZ seems adamant that his brainchild should be able to support the brunt of the transactional demand of tens of thousands of clamoring crypto consumers.
In closing, doing his best to remain nebulous, Zhao noted that the DEX’s beta iteration will launch in the next “couple of weeks,” but was wary to divulge the planned release date for the final product.
What Else Is New For Binance?
News regarding the DEX comes just after the company made a handful of announcements in recent weeks. Along with launching a crypto-to-fiat exchange in Jersey, which was met with copious levels of demand from European citizens, Binance secured a partnership with Simplex, allowing consumers to purchase cryptocurrencies through credit and debit cards. The industry upstart also partnered with Tron to host the ICO of BitTorrent token, a project based on the world-renowned torrenting ecosystem that shares its name.
Binance’s incessant strides in the right direction have even caught the attention of Erik Voorhees, deemed “Bitcoin’s last gunslinger” by Forbes. In a recent tweet, the anti-establishment advocate, who is behind the ShapeShift Exchange, CoinCap, and KeepKey ventures, remarked that he’s “impressed and inspired” by the “incredible success” that Binance has achieved in recent memory. Voorhees went on to extoll Zhao, even remarking that he’s been keeping an ear to the ground, especially as the former OkCoin executive has scaled the rungs of the crypto world.
One cannot but be impressed and inspired by the incredible success that @binance has achieved over the last 1.5 years. @cz_binance it's been awesome watching your ascent, keep up the good #buidling
— Erik Voorhees (@ErikVoorhees) February 7, 2019
Binance may just be a mere fledgling in Bitcoin’s relatively long history. But with this statement at the forefront, many would argue that the company will continue to outshine its rivals, especially due to its ability to stay afloat in brutal, bone-crushing market downturns.
The fact that BNB, the upstart’s in-house token, has surged to the upper echelons of the digital asset space only accentuates this theme. According to Blockonomi’s market analytics tool, BNB, soon to be issued on Binance’s very own blockchain, is now the tenth most valuable cryptocurrency by market capitalization.
