Bitget, a Seychelles-based crypto exchange, has unified its native cryptocurrencies, Bitget Token (BGB) and Bitget Wallet Token (BWB), into a single utility token, BGB.
The move has led to an impressive 22% rise in Bitget Token’s price in the last 24 hours, pushing it to an all-time high (ATH) of $8.45.
In addition, the company revealed that they will burn a whopping $5 billion worth of BGB tokens in a newly unvelied whitepaper.
Token Merge Sparks Market Enthusiasm
At the time of writing, data from CoinGecko showed that the asset’s value had increased by more than 125% over the past seven days, outperforming the global crypto market, which lost 1.50% of its worth in that period. In addition, it has done better than similar centralized exchange (CEX) tokens, which are up about 12.70% on average.
The uptick is even more pronounced across extended periods, with BGB jumping more than 160% in the last fortnight and almost 430% over 30 days. Further, the token’s current price is a massive 1,346.2% improvement over its level from the same time last year, potentially making it the best-performing CEX cryptocurrency of 2024.
BGB’s current market capitalization of over $11.7 billion has propelled it into the #19 position among the largest-capped cryptocurrencies, leaping Stellar (XLM), Polkadot (DOT), and Hedera (HBAR).
In addition to the merger, the team revealed a considerable burn of more than $5 billion worth of tokens, which surely played a role in the price uptick. This represents over 40% of the total supply of BGB.
Utility and Real-World Integration
According to Bitget CEO Gary Chen, the merger will grow BGB’s utility, with plans to use it in decentralized applications (dApps) and major blockchain ecosystems. The integration will also reportedly extend to staking in decentralized finance (DeFi) protocols and to power essential services such as multi-chain gas fee payments.
Beyond the blockchain, the exchange intends to position BGB as a key enabler of real-world applications by allowing payments for dining, travel, and shopping, among others, through its Web3 PayFi service.
The company has assured BWB holders that their assets will be transitioned to BGB through an automated swap process that will convert each BWB token to BGB at a pre-determined ratio. Any remaining BWB has been earmarked for burning to bolster the unified asset’s scarcity and long-term value.
