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Breaking: Binance Withdraws From Canada
It’s time to find a new crypto exchange if you’re a Binance user based in Canada.
Earlier today the world’s biggest crypto exchange announced it was withdrawing from the region over concerns about new stablecoin rules and investor limits. Over the last year Canada has been tightening restrictions on crypto exchanges and released new guidelines for crypto exchanges three weeks ago.
According to a statement from Binance the new rules made it “untenable” for the exchange to operate in the country going forward. The statement left the door open for a return to Canada in the future.
Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, who is a Canadian national, told followers to “take a long term view” and not worry on Twitter.
Binance has been a target of regulators around the world since the collapse of rival FTX and has received attention from the CFTC in the USA and the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority.
Canada’s Increasing Crypto Restrictions
Binance is not the only crypto exchange that has opted out of Canada. Over the last six months dYdX, Paxos and OKX have all opted out Canada.
Canada has been increasing regulations for crypto exchanges and three weeks ago regulators warned that companies who do not adhere to the rules will face potential enforcement. Binance was already prohibited in Ontario because of particularly restrictive laws in the province.
Meanwhile other prominent exchanges including Coinbase, Kraken and Gemini have begun the pre-registration process with Canadian regulators.
Here’s the complete statement from Binance regarding their withdrawal from the Canadian market:
Unfortunately, today we are announcing that Binance will be joining other prominent crypto businesses in proactively withdrawing from the Canadian marketplace.
We would like to thank those regulators who worked with us collaboratively to address the needs of Canadian users. Albeit a small market, it held sentimental value for us as the home country of our founder. We had high hopes for the rest of the Canadian blockchain industry. Unfortunately, new guidance related to stablecoins and investor limits provided to crypto exchanges makes the Canada market no longer tenable for Binance at this time. We put off this decision as long as we could to explore other reasonable avenues to protect our Canadian users, but it has become apparent that there are none.
Our remaining Canadian users are receiving an email with comprehensive information on how this will impact their accounts going forward. While we do not agree with the new guidance, we hope to continue to engage with Canadian regulators aimed at a thoughtful, comprehensive regulatory framework. We are confident that we will someday return to the market when Canadian users once again have the freedom to access a broader suite of digital assets.
We’ll have more on this story as it breaks.
