The Evolution of BNB: From Fees to Global DeFi Infrastructure
BNB launched just over three years ago. It initially found its way to the crypto market through an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) taking place from June 26 to July 3, 2017. BNB was immediately usable as payment for transaction fees on the new cryptocurrency exchange, Binance.com, launched just 11 days after the ICO.
Paying transaction fees in BNB offers users a significant discount. The initial price during the ICO was 1 ETH for 2,700 BNB or 1 BTC for 20,000 BNB, which, at the time, equaled roughly $0.15 per 1 BNB.
In this article, we'll explore BNB’s rise to the top, its utility and use cases, and a comparison of BNB to other top-ranking cryptocurrencies.
BNB and its rise to the top
BNB holds the third-largest cryptocurrency position by market cap at the time of writing at over $42 billion (USD). It follows Ethereum in second place and Bitcoin in first. To reach ETH’s position, BNB needs to multiply its market cap five times; to reach BTC, it needs to grow twenty times. There is a long journey ahead indeed, but let’s look at the journey so far.
From paying Binance trading fees through to sending tokens on BSC, the amount of BNB transactions has continuously risen. March 2021 saw over 84 million alone, and the upward trend looks to grow. How did BNB get to where it is now, from not even being in the top five just two months ago?
What started as a simple utility token has evolved into something much more complex. BNB’s simple purpose of paying discounted Binance trading fees was only the beginning.
We are now dealing with a token with its own native blockchain and a vast range of use cases. These cases aren’t just limited to the Binance ecosystem either. Deployed initially on Ethereum as an ERC-20 token, BNB has since migrated to its new home: BNB Chain. Here it has a place as the network’s native token and also powers the recently launched BNB Smart Chain.
Millions of Binance.com customers use BNB for trading and transaction fees and much more. BNB is also available for use as collateral for crypto loans. There is no single reason why users hold BNB, and many likely have BNB for reasons that vary.
BNB Chain has shown to be hugely popular with developers and users alike. As the ecosystem has matured with decentralized applications and use cases, so too has the adoption of BNB.
A large, diverse BSC and DeFi community developing new projects has become the token’s principal advocate. These external contributors are becoming significant players, including merchant payment companies, travel booking platforms, in-game rewards offerers, and virtual gift providers. They all continue to find strong use cases and attract new audiences to BNB.