The official confirmation is here: Binance has acquired CoinMarketCap (CMC).
The rumour published two days ago has thus turned out to be correct, although the sum has not been revealed. The rumour published by The Block indicated $400 million.
Henceforth, Binance and CoinMarketCap will work together to pursue their common vision of making crypto-assets more widely accessible to everyone worldwide.
The new owner promises that CMC will continue to function as an independent commercial entity and that the two will remain separate entities with a strict policy of independence from each other.
Binance states that it has no relationship with CMC’s rankings, and CMC states that it has no influence over the exchange’s operations. However, CMC will benefit from Binance’s experience and resources, hence this may not be such a clear-cut separation.
Nonetheless, CoinMarketCap is committed to continuing to provide the highest level of information integrity, ensuring accuracy and ranking methodologies. With the new resources, CoinMarketCap intends to expand its information offering to include trading products such as futures, options, loans and value-added data analysis.
This is a merger of two leading players in two different areas of the crypto industry, making Binance a key player in this sector.
The CEO of Binance, Changpeng CZ Zhao, said:
“The core DNA of CoinMarketCap is strongly aligned with Binance’s ethics and culture, from its integrity to its value of freedom, transparency and user-focus. Our common vision will be strengthened by this acquisition to further growth and instill transparency in the industry. This will enable us to build on each other’s strengths, jointly serving as infrastructure providers of crypto.
For many, CoinMarketCap is the landing page of our industry and like Binance, has built its community around user trust. We plan to empower CoinMarketCap to continue to build innovative, useful products for its users and the global community”.
As part of the transition, CoinMarketCap founder Brandon Chez will step down as CEO and be replaced by the current Chief Strategy Officer, Carylyne Chan.
Chez commented:
“I believe that of all the teams in the space that could acquire CoinMarketCap, Binance is one of the very best options. They are a team that have shown, time and again, that they care about their users and will do the best for them, even in the most challenging of times. This spirit will continue to be echoed in our own user-focused philosophy at CoinMarketCap, and I am thrilled to be passing the baton on to Carylyne and the CoinMarketCap team to continue fulfilling my original vision of showcasing the crypto revolution”.
CoinMarketCap’s new interim CEO, Carylyne Chan, added:
“I am optimistic about this new phase of growth for CoinMarketCap,. Ever since our humble beginnings in 2013, we have been public about our commitment to remaining neutral by avoiding censorship and judgement of projects or exchanges that we list, preferring to let users make their own decisions based on the data. We are delighted that the Binance team has been unequivocal in ensuring that we can continue to adhere to our methodology without prejudice.
CoinMarketCap will continue to expand on our mission of making crypto as an industry and asset class more discoverable and efficient, and I am certain many of our users will love the new products and changes we plan to launch at CoinMarketCap in 2020″.