Binance.US plans to eliminate fees for spot bitcoin trading for all customers, in a bid to attract new investors
Exchange's users can trade bitcoin for the U.S. dollar, tether, other stablecoins without spot trading fees — Cryptocurrency exchange Binance.US said it is eliminating fees on spot bitcoin trading for all customers.
Context & Ripple Effects
Binance.US exists because the global exchange cut off US trading customers in 2019 and spun up a domestic venue months later. Three years in, it is now spending its main revenue line — spot trading fees — as a customer-acquisition budget, making bitcoin-to-dollar and stablecoin trades free for everyone.
The move lands mid-race: rival FTX US answered within weeks by opening its own no-fee stock trading to all US users, and derivatives venue Deribit later copied the playbook with zero-fee spot trading of BTC, ETH, and USDC — notably keeping it even after Binance ended its campaign.
First-order effects
- US retail investors can now buy and sell bitcoin against dollars, tether, and other stablecoins without paying spot fees, removing the price friction that most directly deters small first-time trades.
- Binance.US forfeits its core spot-fee revenue on BTC pairs, betting that new-user volume will be monetized through other products instead.
Second-order effects
- FTX US escalates rather than matches, expanding no-fee trading into equities for all US users including non-crypto investors — turning the fee war from a bitcoin pricing fight into a cross-asset land grab for retail accounts.
- Derivatives-focused venues like Deribit are pulled into offering free spot as a funnel for their paid derivatives business, compressing spot fees industry-wide regardless of whether Binance sustains its own promotion.
Third-order effects
- If zero-fee spot becomes table stakes, crypto exchanges converge on the brokerage model: the trade is free, and margin comes from derivatives, listings, and adjacent services — a path Binance itself later extends with zero-commission stock and ETF trading in its super-app push.
- Exchanges that cannot subsidize acquisition from other revenue lines get squeezed toward consolidation or niche positioning, since fee income was the traditional moat for smaller spot venues.
The trend: Crypto exchanges are racing spot trading fees to zero and repositioning the free trade as an acquisition funnel for derivatives and multi-asset 'super app' products.