Binance's "listing fee" exposed: required to hand over 8% of the Token supply, and additionally pay cash and Margin?

Recently, the giant in the Crypto Assets market, Binance, has once again been thrust into the spotlight. A controversy over “listing fees” ignited by CJ Hetherington, founder of the prediction market platform Limitless, has created ripples like a boulder thrown into a calm lake.

CJ publicly accused Binance of requiring project parties to provide up to 8% of the token supply and millions of dollars in fees and margins in exchange for listing qualifications. This move has not only ignited intense debates within the community regarding the transparency of centralized exchanges (CEX), but also intertwines with a series of recent events involving Binance—market flash crashes, abnormal K-line data “fixes,” and the subsequent massive compensation plans—together forming a complex picture of trust, power, and the dilemmas of centralized financial models.

“Sky-high” listing quotation

The starting point of the event is a post made by CJ, the founder of Limitless, on social media. He detailed a list of what is claimed to be the listing cooperation terms from Binance, which caused an uproar in the industry. According to the documents exposed by CJ, if a project wishes to go live on Binance for spot trading and participate in Alpha and perpetual contracts, the cost is extremely high: Token supply requirement (total 8%): 1% is used for the initial airdrop to Binance Web3 wallet users. 3% is allocated for additional airdrops, distributed in batches six months after the Token Generation Event (TGE). 1% is reserved for marketing, to be used at Binance's discretion. 3% is reserved for the BNB HODLer program. Funding and liquidity requirements: Need to deploy the official liquidity pool on Pancake Swap and lock LP tokens with at least $1 million TVL for 90 to 180 days. Pay a refundable deposit of $250,000. Provide tokens worth $200,000 for Binance's affiliate marketing. An additional deposit of $2 million in BNB is required for the launch of spot trading.

In summary, for a project to obtain Binance's “full suite of services,” it not only has to relinquish 8% of its token control but also needs to invest over $3 million in funding costs. CJ also compared this with Coinbase's proposal, stating that the latter focuses more on meaningful constructive cooperation on the Base chain, clearly showing the difference between the two. More dramatically, CJ claimed that Binance's listing team became “too excited” after seeing his project heat up, to the point that they forgot to have him sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA), which allowed him to disclose everything without restraint.

Binance's counterattack

In response to such specific accusations, Binance quickly reacted. Its official customer service channel issued a statement, claiming that CJ's accusations are “false and defamatory,” and reserves the right to take legal action. Binance reiterated several core positions in the statement: Binance will not profit from the token listing process. Any required cash or token margin is to “ensure user safety”, ensuring that the project team can maintain normal operations after the listing, and is generally refundable after 1 to 2 years if specific conditions are met. Binance executives have never sold their tokens.

However, this seemingly tough statement has sparked deeper questions within the community. Many pointed out the logical contradictions in Binance's response: if the documents released by CJ are “false,” why does Binance accuse him of “illegally and without authorization disclosing confidential communications”? This statement, in the eyes of many, is no different from indirectly confirming the authenticity of the documents exposed by CJ.

Mike Dudas, a former investor at The Block and founder of 6MV, further fueled the controversy. He publicly stated that he had seen a listing proposal on Binance that was almost identical to the content exposed by CJ, and emphasized that he had not signed any non-disclosure agreements, thus he was not afraid of legal threats. He bluntly said, “Binance's approach has been in place for many years.”

trust crisis

The listing fee controversy is not an isolated incident; it happens to occur during a sensitive period when Binance's trustworthiness is being severely tested. Looking back at the recent market turmoil, it becomes clearer why the community's reaction has been so intense.

First, there is the market crash triggered by “black box finance.” During the market crash on 1011, a large number of passive market makers (such as DWF Labs, Wintermute) suffered huge losses, while the asset value of exchanges and on-chain liquidity were severely drained. According to Coinglass data, Binance experienced a net outflow of funds as high as $21.75 billion within just a week after the crash, which is undoubtedly a clear signal that investors are voting with their feet. Researcher Aylo sharply pointed out that if the same kind of crash occurred on NASDAQ, the SEC would have already intervened for investigation. This lack of transparency in “black box operations” has caused investor trust in centralized platforms to plummet.

Secondly, there is the “K-line repair” incident. On October 11, 2025, the price of the ATOM/USDT trading pair on the Binance platform plummeted to $0.01, causing a large number of leveraged users to face liquidation. However, hours later, users discovered that the K-line chart had been “repaired,” with the lowest point adjusted to $1.54. At the same time, a similar situation occurred with the IOTX/USDT trading pair, where the price was corrected from $0.00 to $0.00119. However, after the community found out and criticized it, the K-line chart has now reverted to its original display. Binance later explained that this was due to extreme market conditions triggering extremely low historical orders in the system that have existed since 2019, and that modifying the K-line was intended to optimize the front-end display. However, this explanation did not quell the outrage, as over 60% of community users believe this was “data manipulation” by Binance to clear high-leverage positions.

In the face of the successive trust crises, Binance is also trying to turn the situation around. After the market crash, Binance announced the launch of a “Same Boat Plan” with a total amount of $400 million, of which $300 million is used to compensate users who suffered forced liquidation losses during the market fluctuations, and another $100 million is set up for institutional support plans. However, in the absence of a resolution to the transparency issue, whether simple monetary compensation can truly restore users' confidence remains a huge question mark.

Reflections on CEX and the Rise of DEX

This series of events has once again brought the advantages and disadvantages of centralized exchanges (CEX) and decentralized exchanges (DEX) to the forefront. Uniswap founder Hayden Adams pointed out that the development of DEX and automated market makers (AMM) can now provide free listing, trading, and liquidity support for any asset. In his view, the real purpose of project parties choosing to pay high fees to CEX nowadays is more about “market promotion” rather than a necessity of market structure.

CJ's revelations have also sparked vastly different reactions in the Eastern and Western communities. Some users in the Chinese community condemned CJ for “ruining the project's chance to list on Binance,” while major Western investors in Limitless, such as Collider and 1confirmation, publicly supported CJ's actions to break industry unspoken rules and pursue transparency.

This turmoil undoubtedly serves as a wake-up call for all centralized exchanges. When power is overly concentrated and lacks external oversight, potential conflicts of interest and moral hazards become difficult to avoid. Requiring project parties to provide a large number of tokens as “marketing expenses” may actually dilute the token supply, exposing retail investors to greater volatility risks, while exchanges profit from trading fees and free tokens.

Trust is the cornerstone

From the black box operations of market crashes, to the controversies over K-line data, and the exposure of listing fees, the challenges faced by Binance recently all point to the same core issue—trust. In an industry rooted in decentralization and the spirit of “code is law”, transparency and credibility are fundamental to the survival of any platform.

Regardless of the truth behind the controversy over listing fees, it forces the entire encryption industry to reassess the power boundaries and business ethics of CEX. For project parties, it serves as a reminder to seek more transparent cooperation terms and to implement a diversified listing strategy across CEX and DEX. For the vast number of investors, it reaffirms that rooting trust on-chain, grounded in verifiable code, may be the only way to a fairer and more sustainable future in crypto. As an industry leader, how Binance responds to this profound crisis of trust will directly determine its future market position and will have a far-reaching impact on the developmental direction of the entire crypto ecosystem.