By Michael Scott
Crypto exchange Binance is set to convert Monero starting September 2. The conversion period will last until the funds become available on March 1, next year.
Binance is set to utilize the average exchange rate. The move follows the February announcement by the world’s leading crypto exchange by transaction volume that would delist Monero (XMR).
Binance would finalize the decision to delist the privacy coin later that month. The recent blog confirms that Binance is in the last phase of getting XMR off the platform.
In a Monday blog post, Binance intends to convert the existing balances of 15 crypto tokens. Among the tokens identified for delisting include XMR, whose conversion to USD Coin (USDC) starts September 2, 2024.
Binance to Delist Monero
The blog post confirmed that Binance will complete the conversion and make the USDC available in the users’ wallets by March 1 of next year.
The announcement explains that the asset conversion rate will be based on the average exchange rate from next month to March 1, 2025.
Besides Monera, the Monday blog post identifies Bitcoin Gold (BTG), Tribe (TRIBE), Bitshares (BTS), Spartan Protocol (SPARTA), Hegic (HEGIC), Sologenic (SOLO), Navcoin (NAV), and Symbol (XYM). Also affected are the Bitcoin Standard Hashrate Token (BTCST), District0x (DNT), MobileCoin (MOB), Groestlcoin (GRS), Monetha (MTH), and Multichain (MULTI).
The update by Binance appears yet to unfaze XMR despite the looming delisting. Monero is up 0.6% to exchange hands trading for $149.66, per CoinGecko data.
Delisting privacy coins by the leading crypto exchange by volume sets a worrying precedent. Mykola Siusko, a contributor at Web3Privacy Now, decries that Binance appears to widen the gap in initial decentralization and the exercising of regulated surveillance capitalism.
Siusko questions the motive of misleading millions of individuals on the Web3 attributes – freedom and permissionless. The contributor considers Binance as now a part of the surveillance apparatus.
MobileCoin, also a privacy-focused coin, is among those to suffer delisting. The privacy-focused coin utilizes ring signatures to mask the transactions, similar to how Monero works. Binance indicated in the Monday blog post that users will withdraw MobileCoin asset balance until September 1, 2024.
Privacy coins are uniquely designed to enhance transaction anonymity, unlike standard cryptos such as Bitcoin. The coins deploy cryptographic techniques to help obscure transaction details, including addresses and transaction amounts. Doing so makes tracing and linking transactions to specific individuals extremely challenging.
Advocates for privacy coins hail them for safeguarding user privacy and bringing cash-like anonymity to digital transactions. Critics point out that privacy coins harbor the potential for illicit utilization in ransomware payments and money laundering.
Privacy Coins Faces Regulatory Scrutiny
The criticism of the popular privacy coins, including Zcash (ZEC), Monero (XMR), and Dash (DASH), emerges when each adopts different methods to realize anonymity.
The privacy coins are facing regulatory scrutiny, and leading watchdogs in some jurisdictions are considering potential bans. Such is evident with crypto exchanges led by Binance delisting them to comply with the regulations. Despite the challenges, Monero and other privacy coins have grown popular among users seeking to enhance financial privacy in digital-based transactions.
Meanwhile, the Monero (XMR) trading volume has dipped 4.80% in the past 24 hours to $47.586 million, CoinGecko data shows. The tumble in daily trading volume signals a fall in XMR market activity.
XMR price increase of 0.30% in the past seven days leaves Monero underperforming the global crypto market. The latter is 5.80% as the sector regains from last week’s widespread meltdown. Also, XMR trails the layer one crypto and is up 10.70%.
Also, Monero is yet to regain bullish steam to rediscover the all-time high (ATH) price of
$542.33 attained six years ago. Comparatively, XMR is 72.5$ below the ATH price, per CoinGecko data.
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