Binance resumes USDC withdrawals amid record stablecoin outflows

Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, announced at 12:54 a.m. on Wednesday in Hong Kong that USDC stablecoin withdrawals on its platform have resumed.

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Fast facts

• BUSD market capitalization dropped to US$20.2 billion by 01:40 a.m. on Wednesday in Hong Kong from US$21.4 billion at 10:00 p.m. on Tuesday, according to Ethereum blockchain explorer Etherscan.
• Meanwhile, Binance posted at least US$5.2 billion worth of stablecoin outflows on Tuesday, the exchange’s highest ever recorded by on-chain data analytics firm CryptoQuant.
• Binance “temporarily paused” USDC withdrawals on Tuesday while it carried out a “token swap,” which could only be completed after banks in New York opened, allowing BUSD to fiat and then USDC conversion, the company’s chief executive, Changpeng Zhao said in a tweet.
• In September, Binance conducted a “BUSD auto-conversion” which swapped out users’ USDC, USDP and TUSD stablecoins to BUSD, a fiat-backed stablecoin founded by Binance and Paxos, the New York-based issuer of the stablecoin.
• Binance’s cryptocurrency, BNB, fell 2% over the past 24 hours, trading at US$270.46, at 1:40 am in Hong Kong.

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