Binance, the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, has strongly refuted claims made by CJ Hetherington, CEO of Coinbase-backed Limitless Labs, regarding its token listing practices. In a response on social media, Binance labeled the allegations as false and defamatory, and reserved the right to take legal action against Hetherington for unauthorized disclosure of confidential communications.
Hetherington had alleged that Binance demanded approximately 8% of the token supply for listings, including 1% for an airdrop on day one, 3% for further airdrops within six months, 1% for marketing at Binance's discretion, and 3% reserved for the BNB HODLer program. He also claimed Binance required a $250,000 security deposit, $2 million worth of BNB tokens as collateral, and full provision of over $1 million in total value locked (TVL) for a token pool on Pancake Swap.
Binance countered that it does not charge listing fees and that security deposits are refundable within one to two years under certain conditions to ensure project sustainability and user protection. The exchange emphasized that token allocations are for Binance users and denied any involvement in token dumping by its founders.
In support of Hetherington's claims, cryptocurrency analyst Mike Dudas stated he had seen similar Binance listing proposals in the past month, suggesting this has been a long-standing tactic. Conversely, analyst Howard Peng criticized Hetherington as immature for publicizing the terms, advising him to reject the deal if dissatisfied and highlighting issues with Base network listings, which he said often drop significantly post-listing.
