Binance has responded to concerns over a suspiciously large transaction involving the recently listed memecoin, Book of Meme (BOME), by clarifying that the transaction was not linked to any of its staff.
The clarification comes amid allegations of insider trading, as detailed by on-chain data firm Lookonchain, which reported a large BOME purchase made shortly before the coin’s explosive growth on the exchange.
Additionally, Binance has announced a reward program offering between $100,000 to $5 million for information on fraudulent activities, including insider trading.
The incident in question involved a crypto whale acquiring 314 million BOME tokens at $0.0074 each, amounting to $2.3 million, through the Raydium decentralized exchange. Following Binance’s listing of BOME and the introduction of trading pairs against Bitcoin, Tether, First Digital USD, and the Turkish Lira, the token’s price surged by over 1500%.
Community members and observers raised questions about the timing of the transaction, speculating on the possibility of insider information being used to profit from the listing. Binance’s quick response included an internal investigation, which found no evidence of staff involvement in the transaction.
On Reddit, one user asked whether the trade was merely luck or if it stemmed from insider information, while another suggested that the trader could be an insider affiliated with Binance.
Amidst the Solana memecoin frenzy, while some individuals made handsome gains, not everyone shared in the luck. On March 15, a trader who had acquired BOME tokens very early missed out on potential millions in gains after selling their tokens just a day before the token’s price surged.
The trader offloaded 170 million tokens for $131,000, only to see the token’s value skyrocket thereafter. At current market prices, those tokens would have been valued at $2.3 million.
