Binance Plans to Spend $1B in Coming Months: CEO

Refusing to retreat due to the pounding crypto winter, Changpeng Zhao, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange by market capitalization have announced that his firm will be spending about $1 billion on acquisition and investment deals over the next three months. 

In the past nine months, Binance has spent a total of $325 million on 67 projects. This does not take into account the ongoing investment in Twitter and Forbes Media which will likely be transferred to 2023 if it finally pulls through.  The crypto exchange is set to invest more than $200 million in Forbes and about $500 million in Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition which has been revived. 

Taking cognizance of Binance’s $140 million investment in 73 projects in 2021, it is noteworthy that the exchange has scaled up its portfolio.

Through its venture capital Binance Labs, in August the exchange invested in Ankr, well-known for introducing BNB Liquid Staking and building some of the BNB Chain’s core infrastructures, notably its Erigon upgrade.

Binance is Not Considering Bankrupt Firms

A few months ago, FTX Sam Bankman-Fried seem like the crypto ‘saviour’ as he rose to the occasion of assisting several crypto lenders and hedge fund managers who were drowning owing to the ongoing crypto blood bath. In the same fashion as Binance CEO, Bankman-Fried announced that he has a few billion to support struggling firms and stabilize the market.

One of the beneficiaries of SBM’s ‘benevolence’ is crypto lender, BlockFi which FTX acquired for $15 million. FTX also obtained a 30% stake in a New York-based global investment firm known as SkyBridge Capital.

However, Zhao is more definite about where his investment is going, he is not looking at saving any distressed or bankrupt entities. Precisely, he intends to make his investments in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Non-fungible token (NFT)-related organizations. 

Binance CEO said “We did look at a lot of lenders in recent months because that’s where all the issues are. “Many of them, they just take a user’s money and give it to somebody else. There’s not a lot of intrinsic value. In that case, what’s to acquire? We want to see real products that people use.”