BNB Surges to Record High at $1,370 Amid $19B Crypto Market Chaos

BNB, the native token of Binance’s ecosystem, reached a new all-time high of $1,370 on Monday, defying a broader crypto market downturn that wiped out $19 billion in leveraged positions over the weekend.

The rally underscores BNB’s resilience and investor confidence even as traders faced widespread liquidations and technical disruptions.

According to CoinMarketCap data, BNB outpaced major assets including Bitcoin and Ethereum, rebounding sharply from weekend lows. The surge highlights the token’s strength within Binance’s crypto ecosystem after a weekend crash that trigger the forced liquidations across exchanges.

Many investors blamed Binance for the market chaos, claiming that the exchange technical glitches left them paralysed and unable to close their positions during this critical timing. One of the disgruntled users even vented his frustration on his social media, saying

“I’m done with Binance. They shut down their system during a major market crash, leaving me unable to close my futures positions.”

Binance co-founder Yi He pushed the blame to broader market conditions, claiming that it was the whole volatility was driven by "overall market conditions."

“The proportion of forced liquidation amounts processed by Binance relative to total trading volume was at a normal low level, indicating this fluctuation was primarily driven by overall market conditions.”

Yi also argued that while there were some brief lags in the platform's modules, the core infrastructures, including contract engines, spot matching systems, and the training API remained stable throughout the volatility.

Binance also since promised to delegate $283 million to compensate all the users who were affected by the whole saga.

Market Scrutiny Intensifies

Adding to the controversy, Hyperliquid CEO Jeff Yan warned that some centralized exchanges has been dishonest with their reporting of their liquidations report, raising questions about the transparency of CEX reporting during high-volatility events.

"Some CEXs publicly document that the dramatically underreport user liquidations."

She adds that because sometimes these liquidations happen in less than a second and they often happen in burst, thus the differences in what is reported and what has actually happened could be 100 times under what was really happening.

Market observers also pointed their fingers at Wintermute, blaming the firms for contributing to the market crash after uncovering that Wintermute transferred roughly $700 million in Bitcoin to Binance hours before the crash, contributing to the sudden liquidation pressures.

“Hours before the dump:Wintermute moved $700 M to Binance. Then bang. At $108k, liquidation velocity hit max speed. Buttons froze. Stops failed.”

Wintermute’s activity echoes February’s $2.24 billion liquidation event, when institutional selling triggered cascading margin calls. Evgeny Gaevoy, Wintermute founder, suggested that 2025’s crypto crashes are “directly linked to TradFi events,” citing volatility from AI firm DeepSeek and President Trump’s tariffs on China as contributing factors.

Despite market turbulence, BNB’s record surge signals continued investor faith in Binance’s ecosystem. However, ongoing concerns over platform glitches, underreported liquidations, and large market maker activity may draw increased scrutiny from regulators and investors alike, underscoring the fragility and complexity of crypto markets in times of stress.