BNB Turns 8: From Obscurity to 10,000x Juggernaut – A Crypto Success Story
Eight years ago, BNB was just another altcoin fighting for attention. Today? It's the crypto equivalent of turning pocket change into a private island.
The 10,000x club
That's not hyperbole—the numbers speak for themselves. A single $100 investment at launch would now buy you a decent Manhattan apartment (if you ignore the 40% broker fees and questionable plumbing).
Defying the bears
While traditional finance was busy shorting innovation, BNB quietly built an ecosystem that now rivals small nations' GDP. The token outlasted three 'crypto winters,' two exchange collapses, and approximately 47,000 'Bitcoin is dead' headlines.
The road ahead
Regulators are circling, competitors are copying, and the 'growth at all costs' model is getting scrutiny. But for now? The birthday candles are burning bright—even if some investors still can't explain what the chain actually does.
From ICO to Icon
Binance held the initial coin offering (ICO) for BNB from June 26 to July 3, 2017. The asset’s total supply was 200 million at the time; however, Binance offered only 100 million tokens for public sale. The firm had allocated the remaining 50% to the founding team and angel investors at 40% and 10%, respectively.
During the public sale, Binance raised $15 million by selling each token for 15 cents. ICO participants were to either pay one ether (ETH) for 2,700 BNB or one Bitcoin (BTC) for 20,000 BNB. Eleven days after the ICO, the Binance exchange opened for trading, alongside BNB.
Following the completion of the Binance Chain in April 2019, BNB migrated from Ethereum to become the native token of the new network. Over the years, the Binance Chain has undergone several modifications that have led it to become the BNB Chain known today.
In 2021, BNB became the third-largest crypto asset by market capitalization. However, it is currently the fifth-biggest, trailing behind Ripple’s XRP and Tether’s USDT, with a market cap of $98.4 billion.
Rising Institutional Adoption
Shortly after launching BNB, Binance decided to reduce the token’s supply by 100 million BNB, so it started a buyback and burn program. The aim was to repurchase BNB from the market and destroy the coins by sending them to a black address.
In December 2021, Binance introduced a BNB Auto-Burn program, which automatically adjusts the amount of BNB to be destroyed based on price and transaction block metrics. The company just completed its 32nd burn, reducing the asset’s total supply to about 139.28 million BNB.
The frequent burning of BNB has made the coin scarce, and as a result, more valuable. The asset was worth roughly $706 at the time of writing, marking at least 10,000x growth. This mechanism could be a contributing factor in pushing the coin to new highs as time progresses.
Meanwhile, BNB is seeing increased institutional adoption. Some companies have adopted the asset in their corporate treasuries, with one intending to own at least $1 billion worth of BNB.
