The BNB chain has launched a $45 million “reload airdrop” aimed at compensating users who suffered losses trading Memecoin during Friday’s market crash.
The network said on Monday that the initiative will distribute BNB (BNB) tokens to more than 160,000 eligible addresses. Airdrops will begin this week and will be completed by early November.
BNB Chain is a blockchain network developed by Binance that is now maintained by a decentralized community. It powers the ecosystem’s native BNB token and supports applications in DeFi, gaming, and digital assets.
According The rewards will be randomly allocated to Changpeng Zhao, founder and former CEO of Binance. Ecosystem partners like Four Memes, PancakeSwap, Binance Wallet, and Trust Wallet will help distribute funds to eligible traders.
The airdrop follows Friday’s market crash, which resulted in nearly $20 billion in liquidations across crypto markets, the largest single-day wipeout in the industry’s history.
According to data, BNB reached a new all-time high of $1,370 per token on Monday morning coinmarketcapThe rebound came even as Binance faced backlash from users who accused the exchange of worsening the market turmoil during the crash.
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Binance reacts to crypto selloff
US President Donald Trump’s Truth Social post threatening 100% tariffs on Chinese imports sent crypto markets into a historic liquidation on Friday, leaving Binance in the eye of the storm.
Many Binance users reported glitches in the system during the downturn, leaving them unable to exit their positions. One trader, SleeperShadow, wrote x On Saturday, Binance “shut down its systems during a major market crash”, leaving traders “unable to close out” futures positions.
Another flashpoint came from Athena’s synthetic dollar, USDE, which fell to $0.65 on Binance on October 11, but remained close to its $1 peg elsewhere. Guy Young, founder of USDE issuer Athena Labs, said the DEPG could be attributed to Binance using Oracle data from its own orderbook rather than an external price feed, where liquidity was comparatively thin.
The third issue was that altcoins, including IoTex (IOTX), Enjin (ENJ) and Cosmos (ATOM), dropped to $0 on Binance during the market downturn, despite being listed above $0 on other exchanges.
On Sunday, Binance issued a “statement on recent market volatility” to address users concernsThe exchange wrote that it conducted a “comprehensive review”, confirming that its “key futures” remained operational during the market downturn.
Binance said the brief price decline for specific spot pairs was caused by old limit orders amid low liquidity during the sell-off. The exchange said that a separate “zero value” display glitch resulted from a recent change in decimal settings, rather than the token actually falling to zero.
It also noted that forced liquidations on its platform comprised only a small portion of total market activity, suggesting that volatility was primarily driven by broader market conditions rather than internal malfunctions.
Nevertheless, Binance acknowledged that the dipping of USDE (as well as BNSOL and WBETH) caused some users who held these assets as collateral to liquidate their positions. In response, the exchange covered its losses, totaling $283 million.
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