Yahoo Finance Binance eliminates some bitcoin trading fees
Binance, one of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchanges by trading volume, said Wednesday that it would remove trading fees for 13 of its bitcoin trading pairs.
“In line with our user-first philosophy, Binance has always strived to provide the most competitive fees in the industry," Binance Founder and CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao said in a statement. "At its core, Binance is an inclusive platform with accessibility in mind. Eliminating the trading fees on selected BTC spot trading pairs is another move towards that direction.”
Starting July 8, customers can trade bitcoin without fees with stablecoins such as Tether (USDT), USD coin (USDC) and Binance's own stablecoin (BUSD), as well as the Euro (EUR) and Turkish Lira (TRY). Binance hasn't extended the offer to trading between bitcoin and the U.S. dollar.
Binance held 73% of crypto-only spot market share as of last month, according to data compiled by the Block. The new system will be in effect "for the foreseeable future," according to a Binance spokesperson.
The offering, which the firm attributed to celebrating its 5th year anniversary, follows a similar announcement from the firm's U.S. subsidiary on June 22.
"Outside of its anniversary, the obvious answer for why Binance is offering lower bitcoin trading fees is because [crypto trading] volumes have been going down," Chris Brendler, senior research analyst at D.A. Davidson, told Yahoo Finance. "It's more of a marketing initiative to generate trading activity alongside their anniversary."
On June 27, Zhao told Yahoo Finance Live that the firm was seeing “a lot of opportunities in the market” given worsening conditions, citing increased hiring and "50 to 100" M&A deals it was considering in addition to exploring lowered trading fees.
Bitcoin's price hovered around $20,100 per coin as of midday Wednesday. The largest cryptocurrency by market capitalization, bitcoin has fallen more than 57 % since the beginning of the year.
The market capitalization for all cryptocurrencies sits at roughly $908 billion, down from more than $2.1 trillion in value at the beginning of the year.
This post has been updated with analyst comment.
David Hollerith covers cryptocurrency for Yahoo Finance. Follow him @dshollers.
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