I was checking my wallet on Binance these days and I had a pleasant surprise of seeing addition tokens alongside my crypto assets. Starknet tokens landed into my account without my knowledge and it seems that was based on the ETH staked on Binance through a snapshot taken on 2022-09-15 and which matured on Feb 2024. The distribution of this airdrop got me 187 Starknet tokens.
Starknet technology
While there is huge potential in this incoming new crypto project like Starknet - "Starknet utilizes the power of STARK technology to ensure computational integrity. By validating off-chain transactions with advanced math and cryptography, Starknet overcomes Ethereum’s scalability limitations. Starknet is a Validity Rollup that provides unlimited scale while retaining Ethereum’s security and decentralization." - I had my fair share of ALT projects to try out and got quite a bit of experience in rolling them over. Some of them might truly shine, but most of them will go down to the drain. And as I didn't want to have another "wait and see" experience I decided to sell these tokens and convert them to BNB.
Conversion strategy
As there wasn't a market for exchanging STRK for BNB, I have performed the exchange in two steps:
- Exchanged 187.81 STRK tokens to 362.848 USDT
- Exchanged 362.25 USDT for 0.875 BNB tokens
This way I have increased my BNB holding which I hope to give me a bigger share in the future Launchpool and Launchpad projects participation. While BNB might not be the preferred crypto asset for many of you, I still believe that it incapsulates a lot of value and it provides recurring revenue streams to the programs that Binance offer through BNB participation. And on top of that we see that they offer also airdrops for different assets that one might hold on the Exchange, even if that might not be recommended.
Binance Airdrop page
With this occasion I also found the Airdrop section on the Binance Exchange, which I believe it is a good resource to bookmark and check from time to time.
https://www.binance.com/en/airdrop
Here one can see both the Ongoing and Completed airdrops offering more transparency on it and the conditions that you need to fulfill in order to participate to ongoing campaigns.
Diversification of crypto is imperative for the success of any investor in this space and I believe that Binance through the BNB asset holds a strong position in the most valuable cryptocurrencies. For sure its centralization poses a risk, but in the same it provided good opportunities along the way and still holds strong. If the funds coverage is as they prove it, I believe it might be safe enough to invest in it. While I don't hold a life changing chunk in BNB, I still enjoy the benefits of participating in the Binance economy. In the end everything matters, so having such revenue streams is quite good in my opinion.