A recent six-month investigation by Forbes' Javier Paz into Binance's operations has raised questions about the company's ownership of its native token, BNB. Published on Friday, Paz alleges that Binance owns 76% of BNB tokens, a figure derived from a detailed analysis of the company's crypto wallets.
The report scrutinizes the 2017 ICO of Binance. Paz posits that only 10.78 million BNB tokens were sold in the public offering during the summer of that year, a figure far removed from the claimed 100 million. The report further alleges that Binance inflated investor allocations to 40 million tokens and raised less than $5 million. This contradicts CEO Changpeng Zhao's previous statement that the company raised $15 million.
The Forbes report draws parallels between Binance's situation and FTX's existential crisis. It continues a trend of negative portrayal of Binance by Forbes. Adam Cochran, a critic of the company, is also mentioned in the report.
Despite these allegations potentially leading to a billion-dollar windfall for Binance, there has been no response from either the company or its CEO Changpeng Zhao as of Friday.
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