The Binance subsidiary in the United States announced that deposits and withdrawals in US dollars will be suspended starting next week, as a result of the lawsuit by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) of the North American country.
In a release Posted late Thursday, the company said that due to a lawsuit filed by the US securities regulator, the company’s banking and payment partners notified them of their interest in pause the dollar deposit and withdrawal channels as of June 13, 2023.
This means that Binance.US’s ability to accept dollar deposits and process fiat withdrawals “Will be affected”, as advised by the company.
The divestiture of the banking partners, Binance.US alleges, is in response to the SEC’s “extremely aggressive and intimidation tactics” against the US digital asset industry.” Something that has meant “challenges” for the banks with which the exchange worksas explained in the statement.
For this reason, they are informing users in time “so that they can take the necessary measures”, This is because they will make a transition to operate with partners that work only with cryptocurrencies.
In this sense, the company informs that until they have “more stable banking partners”, Binance.US It will remain a cryptocurrency-only exchange.“at least for a time”.
In addition to the suspension of US dollar deposits and withdrawals, the platform also announced that starting next week, Existing US currency pairs will begin to be removed, including the BTC-USD pair. However, they will continue to support pairs with stablecoins, such as BTC-USDT, for example.
The removal of the pairs was announced on June 7 by Binance.US. As CriptoNoticias reported, the company announced the disincorporation of at least 100 pairs for trading with cryptocurrencies from the tether (USDT), bitcoin (BTC) and BUSD markets.
Binance.US reported in its statement last night that all US dollar-denominated balances held within the platform they will be converted into a stablecoin that can be withdrawn after June 15, 2023.
Binance.US argues that Reserves of all client assets are held at a 1:1 parity. Therefore, “customer funds are always safe, secure and available”.
They also indicate that all other cryptocurrency-related services “remain fully operational.” Among those are trading, staking, depositing, and withdrawing crypto assets.
Binance.US reinforced his interest in “strongly defending himself” against the lawsuit the SEC and “its attacks without merit” any.
The Consequences of the SEC Lawsuit
As reported by CriptoNoticias, the United States securities regulator officially sued Binance and its founder and CEO, Changpeng Zhao, alleging that the company and its businesses violated the country’s federal securities laws.
The SEC also requested leave from the district court handling the case to freeze the funds of Binance.US, although the company clarified shortly after that User assets are protected by the Safe Asset Fund for Users (SAFU).
Together with Binance, the US Securities and Exchange Commission sued Coinbase, the largest cryptocurrency exchange in that country, for crimes similar to those accused of Binance, that is, the alleged violation of securities laws.
Binance and Coinbase stated their intention to wage a legal battle in court against the SEC. Both companies agree that it is a crusade by the securities regulator against the cryptocurrency industry in the United States, which has had a strong presence for years.