Three exchange-related events surfaced on September 22, 2026, highlighting different types of risk in crypto markets. Upbit, South Korea's largest exchange, designated Sophon (SOPH) trading pairs as caution markets and suspended deposits, while Binance said it would remove seven USDC spot pairs on September 25. At the same time, Ethena's USDe stablecoin briefly printed a sharp discount on Binance before recovering, raising questions about localized liquidity rather than a broad depeg.
Upbit placed SOPH/KRW, SOPH/BTC and SOPH/USDT under trading caution, citing concerns over timely disclosure of material information, changes to Sophon's circulating-supply plan, and transparency of related procedures. The review period runs from September 22 through October 12 to October 16. Upbit can remove the caution, extend it, or terminate trading support depending on Sophon's response. Deposits for SOPH were suspended immediately.
Binance's action is narrower. Effective September 25 at 03:00 UTC, the exchange will remove AIXBT/USDC, DOLO/USDC, ENJ/USDC, HUMA/USDC, SXT/USDC, TNSR/USDC and TURTLE/USDC pairs after its periodic review cited liquidity and trading volume issues. Spot Trading Bot services for those markets will also end. The underlying tokens are not being delisted, and Binance said users can still trade them through other available pairs.
USDe produced the largest price move. On Binance's USDE/USDT market, the stablecoin briefly printed $0.9202 around 13:00 on September 22, roughly 8% below its $1 reference price, before recovering close to parity within minutes. By comparison, Bitget's USDe market bottomed near 0.997 USDT, a deviation of about 0.3%. That makes Binance's maximum deviation more than 26 times larger, according to available data. The move occurred shortly before a scheduled Binance maintenance window, but no evidence currently links the two events. The pattern points to a localized order-book dislocation rather than a system-wide failure of USDe's backing or redemption mechanism.
For traders, the next signals differ by event: cross-venue USDe liquidity and onchain pricing, Sophon's disclosure response to Upbit, and post-September 25 volume migration away from the closed Binance USDC markets.
