Market Analysis Report (07 Nov 2022)

Leading cryptocurrency exchange Binance has announced it has decided to sell all of its remaining FTT tokens. FTT is the native token of the FTX ecosystem, a rival cryptocurrency exchange.

Binance used to have a minority stake in FTX, but it exited its investment last year, and received at the time $2.1 billion in BUSD and FTT. It has now decided to unload its remaining FTT tokens after “recent revelations came to light,” according to Binance’s CEO Changpeng Zhao.

Binance holds around 23 million FTT, worth over $500 million. Per Zhao, Binance’s sale will take months to complete, due to “market conditions and limited liquidity.” Zhao did not specify what revelations he was referring to, although some speculated it was a leaked balance sheet of Alameda Research, a crypto trading firm owned by FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried.

Alameda’s balance sheet revealed it was seemingly propped up by FTT. The balance sheet revealed there Alameda’s balance sheet included $5.82 billion of FTT, while FTT’s entire supply is slightly above $3.3 billion.

Alameda Chief Executive Officer, Caroline Ellison, said on social media that the balance sheet was a “subset of our corporate entities” and that the firm has over $10 billion of assets that weren’t reflected on it. Ellison later offered to buy Binance’s FTT at $22 a piece.