Tornado Cash Token Falls 50% After Binance Delisting

The native token of the Tornado Cash crypto mixer lost half its value after a delisting announcement from crypto exchange Binance.

Crypto mixer Tornado Cash’s governance token TORN saw a sharp decline in price on Monday after crypto exchange Binance disclosed plans to delist the token.

#Binance will delist the following tokens on December 07, 2023.

🔸 $BTS
🔸 $PERL
🔸 $TORN
🔸 $WTC

Full details here ⬇️https://t.co/0a1a1Zu8oS

— Binance (@binance) November 27, 2023

TORN dropped 50% from an intra-day high of $3.96 to a little under $1.92 at the time of writing. At its all-time high in February 2021, TORN was trading above the $436 mark. 

“At Binance, we periodically review each digital asset we list to ensure that it continues to meet the high level of standard we expect. When a coin or token no longer meets this standard, or the industry changes, we conduct a more in-depth review and potentially delist it. We believe this best protects all our users,” said the Binance team in a blog post explaining the decision.

Binance is currently in the hot seat with regulators, with the exchange having recently paid a $4.3 billion fine to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and its CEO Changpeng Zhao stepped down with orders to remain in the U.S. until his sentencing in February.

Meanwhile, Tornado Cash has also been on the U.S authorities radar for unfavourable reasons, with the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) sanctioning the protocol for its use as a virtual currency mixer that allegedly facilitates money laundering.

The decision to delist TORN is hardly surprising given the protocol’s status in regulators’ eyes, especially considering the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is still looking for evidence of FTX-style misconduct on Binance’s part related to commingling of customer funds on the platform.