Binance Co-Founder He Yi Issues Stark Warning: Stop Riding Our Coattails
He Yi, a co-founder of crypto giant Binance, just threw cold water on a popular—and risky—market play. Her target? The swarm of tokens trying to hitch a free ride on Binance's brand and user base.
The Piggyback Problem
It's a classic crypto hustle. Projects with names, logos, or narratives that vaguely echo Binance's success try to lure investors. The implied promise? Proximity to the exchange might mean a future listing, a partnership, or just reflected glory. He Yi's message cuts through the noise: don't fall for it.
Reputation Isn't a Free Asset
Building a brand like Binance's takes years of operational scale, navigating regulatory minefields, and surviving market cycles. He Yi's warning underscores that this hard-earned reputation isn't community property for any project to borrow. It's a direct shot at the 'vibes-based' investing that still plagues corners of the market—where a clever name sometimes outweighs a working product.
The Due Diligence Imperative
The call to action is clear. Investors need to bypass the hype and scrutinize fundamentals. What's the token's actual utility? Who's on the team? Is the technology sound? Relying on a perceived Binance 'connection' is a flimsy strategy, a lesson often learned the hard way when the music stops.
In a world where 'number go up' is too many people's entire thesis, a reminder to do the actual work feels almost radical. It's the finance equivalent of being told to eat your vegetables while everyone else is grabbing candy—annoying, but probably right.
He Yi’s response
He Yi did not like the implications of the statement the user made on X. According to her, the official Binance X account is run by competent staff who have the freedom to choose the style of posts. However, that freedom is restricted to their work and the level of creativity they are allowed to apply while doing it.
He Yi drew the line at the participation of said employees in the launching or promotion of any tokens.
She acknowledged the fact that the BNB memecoin space getting active again has encouraged the community to start tokenizing words excerpted from posts made by the official Binance X account, or by her. But none of that has anything to do with Binance itself. She also insisted that the increased frequency does not mean they will stop posting.
She clarified that her statement regarding “encouraging employees to innovate and try” has to do with only their daily work and not “coin issuance projects.”
Her post comes at a time when tokenization has taken center stage in crypto discussions, and memecoins have become a fixture in the patchwork.
Binance brass preach accountability
It is not the first time He Yi has spoken up about the current token trend. In the past, she has urged users to take responsibility for their actions and start actively trying to protect themselves from pump and dump schemes by doing better research and being more vigilant.
Chanpeng Zhao has also sounded similar warnings several times in the past. As recently as last month, he took action against people he claimed were selling X accounts he was following by unfollowing many of them.
Those accounts have reportedly been used for a laundry list of bad acts.
Zhao urged users on X to avoid buying those handles, promising to “unfollow any sold accounts,” and asking his followers to report any account they see on sale.
“Let me know,” he wrote. “DM, tweet, notify interns,” adding that he follows accounts randomly because they are “supportive, informative, positive energy people in the community.”
Regardless of their warnings, the crypto trenches tend to defy logic and warnings. It only took one photo of CZ’s dog before countless meme tokens named for the Broccoli went viral. CZ’s tweet about the upcoming release of the BNB Chain’s Four.meme token launch at the time also set off a frenzy for meme coins, so-named too.
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