A Stable of Binance Coins – General musings

By now I’m sure that most of you have heard that Binance will be launching it’s own stablecoins soon. They have been testing with a small amount of BGBP – a coin pegged to the British Pound (GBP) and they say that others are in the pipeline.

The Binance approach is an interesting one, because unlike most other stablecoins, they are not focussing on USD based coins. Indeed, they are specifically NOT focussing on USD.

Binance has clearly been studying the stablecoin environment for some time, you can see the results of this in their stablecoins research report published last month: “The Evolution of Stablecoins”. They’ve also just listed (this past Monday) the first stablecoin on Binance DEX, and it isn’t even one of their own. Stably (USDS) is an Ethereum-based, USD-pegged coin. A BEP2 version of USDS now resides on the Binance Chain, it is known as USDS.B.

I’m not a big fan of stablecoins. I really don’t like the idea of a “cryptocurrency” which is backed by fiat. The inherent value of cryptocurrencies in no way relies on any form of fiat backing, that’s the point of using crypto! I don’t even like the gold backed ones, in fact those can be very scam-prone. I find the rise in popularity of KBC to be very concerning. Don’t people ever learn?

Having said that, I realise that the vast majority of the world is still firmly set in their fiat mentality, and I recognise the value of stablecoins as “bridges” into the crypto world.

I’m actually rather pleased to see Binance launching it’s own stablecoins. I generally trust Binance, it has proven to have a very good leader in CZ and I believe that it has the best interests of the entire cryptoverse at heart. I think it is a shrewd move on their part to launch stablecoins which rival USD based stablecoins. Having coins based on currencies such as GBP or the Euro is a move in the right direction. At the moment USD still dominates the crypto world as it’s main”trading partner”, that will change.

As money and power shift ever Eastwards, so major Asian currencies will become ever more important in the theatre of global economics, cryptocurrencies included. Binance also intends to build stablecoins based on currencies such as the Chinese Renminbi. It is conceivable that Yuan backed cryptos will one day come to dominate the stablecoin environment. Binance is positioning itself very early to benefit from this further down the line. This is a bold strategic move, one which I think will pay off handsomely (hold onto your BNB!).

On that note, I should mention that one of the main reasons I am so bullish on NEO is that I foresee a shift in popularity from Western coins to Eastern coins. The current crypto Top Ten Market Cap list is very much a Eurocentric list based on the sentiment of Eurocentric money. That is likely to change…

I look forward to seeing how the new Binance stablecoins will help to boost adoption of cryptocurrencies. I hope to see the stranglehold of shady-looking coins such as Tether broken. I’m very eager to see how the popularity of Chinese coins will grow.

May we live in interesting times.