News Binance CEO Hints BNB Token ‘Hodlers’ May Get Launchpad VIP Access
Georgi Georgiev | Mar 22, 2019 | 11:00
Following Celer Network’s ‘successful’ token sale on Binance Launchpad, Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao has hinted that a new model where BNB holders will get first dibs on new token launches may be in the works.
Celer Network Sale ‘Success’
Binance Launchpad concluded its third token sale for the year. The project, called Celer Network, sold out its planned supply of almost 600 million CELR tokens in a little less than 18 minutes.
The event raised a grand total of $4 million. Bitcoinist reported earlier this year on BitTorrent’s ICO launched through Binance’s platform, which managed to raise $7.1 million in 15 minutes.
Fetch.AI was the project prior to Celer Network, which also sold out in seconds, reaching its hard cap of $6 million.
Immediately after the CELR sale concluded, Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao, revealed that it was “actually the highest buy demand sale we seen so far.”
How Successful Was The Sale Really?
Hours before the CELR sale started, Binance officially instructed users to refresh the dedicated tokens sale page as soon as the timer hits zero.
Many users, however, complained that by doing so, the platform had logged them out, rendering them unable to log back in for a short period of time. Once they did manage to get back onto the page, most of the users had their orders placed in a queue and were never processed.
Hence, the majority of those who tried to participate failed to get a piece of the highly sought-after CELR token.
Commenting on the matter, Zhao explained that the platform “still had capacity/caching issues”, while reassuring that they “will keep working on it for a better experience in the future.”
Still, the results speak for themselves.
“STATS: 39003 people tried to buy, 3129 people got some. 35000 people will be somewhat unhappy,” said CZ.
It’s worth noting that the same concerns were expressed by the community during the first two token sales as well.
The Solution? Dibs For BNB ‘Hodlers’
Immediately after the CELR token sale, Zhao hinted at a possible solution for the bottleneck problem.
Interestingly enough, instead of increasing server capacity to cope with demand, Zhao suggested another alternative. One that would incentivize Binance Coin (BNB) users to become ‘hodlers.’
“We *may* try a different approach next time, a BNB holding allocation model. Still thinking about it…”
The idea seems to be growing in popularity, as a recent discussion on Twitter is gaining momentum.
Careful what you wish for https://t.co/eeQvfDrUXI
— CZ Binance (@cz_binance) March 21, 2019
As it is right now, all the sales launched to Binance Launchpad are explicitly available to BNB holders, as the tokens are only purchased with BNB. The only exception so far has been BitTorrent’s sale, where users were also allowed to buy tokens with Tron’s TRX.
In other words, the contemplated structure would have to impose an additional requirement, such as holding BNB for a certain amount of time, for example.
The main question, however, still remains. Why not, first and foremost, increase server capacity to handle the increasing demand?
Perhaps the launchpad bottlenecks are not a bug but a feature. Think: Apple and what they used to do with iPhones when only select stores received the new models initially, resulting in long queues and additional media hype.
One thing is obvious, though. Since Binance Launchpad started launching sales, BNB has performed splendidly, gaining around 150 percent since January 1st. So incentivizing BNB token holders to ‘hodl’ in exchange for VIP access is likely another (brilliant) way to pump its price.
[Disclaimer: The author of this article holds a small amount of BNB.]
What do you think of the proposed changes for Binance Launchpad? Don’t hesitate to let us know in the comments below!
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