Binance(& CZ) lied when they acquired CoinMarketCap and stated that Binance will not influence CMC rankings, and that CMC will be independent. Instead, CMC rankings were massively manipulated and Binance market share had also magically tripled since the a

Back in 2020, Binance bought the well-known token price aggregator CoinmarketCap. The deal is reported to be worth between 300-400 Million. Interestingly, it is said that BNB used in part as funding for the deal. Of course, CZ made statements that they would not make changes to affect to functioning of CoinMarketCap.

From Binance

Interesting assertion there, because that's not what the receipts show. Let me explain.

Binance acquired CMC in around April 2020 and the deal was in the works since late 2019. Just before/during the deal in April, Binance was actual ranked as low as #25 on CMC.

April before acquisition

However, soon after the deal, Binance were suddenly ranked #1. And Binance has, as far as I'm aware, NEVER fallen from the #1 rank since this time after they bought CMC.

June after acquisition

What actually happened here was CMC miraculously changed they exchange ranking criteria soon after they were acquired that just happened to massively benefit Binance. A major factor is the web traffic score. As stated:

https://preview.redd.it/6fl7q4rf8axb1.png?width=718&format=png&auto=webp&s=cc12dd483edb964d90011af2efc8c577c10b9c8c

Such that the top exchange is always given a perfect score of 1000 which MASSIVE pushes the rankings in favour of Binance. Especially with their expansion at all cost mentality, with their many lawsuits of operating without licenses among of legal troubles in Italy, Japan, Canada, Cayman Islands, Thailand, Malaysia, the UK, the USA, South Africa, and Singapore etc. Basically, if you're the biggest exchange, of course you'll have the best web traffic score, on top of that fact that you can simply expand your marketing budget to receive to most web traffic.

The liquidity Score factor of ranking also tends to unfairly benefit them due to their size.

The thing is that many newcomers to crypto first check crypto prices and many if not most end up on CoinMarketCap. If you can influence CoinMarketCap to make your exchange seem like the best, that is an easy way to secure lots off new users and expand market share.

And consider that Binance's size grew from 16% in 2020 in April before buying CMC to 62% at the end of 2022(before all the CFTC/SEC lawsuits etc), I'd say it was a hell of a return on investment.

2020

2022

https://www.binance.com/en/blog/all/binance-x-coinmarketcap-joining-forces-to-make-crypto-more-accessible-worldwide-421499824684900494

https://www.coingecko.com/research/publications/centralized-crypto-exchanges-market-share

EDIT: u/slasherzx has pointed out CMC is charging $5000 USD to correct a mistake that CMC themselves made in the information regarding the circulating supply of an altcoin by the name of Ergo. I can't speak too much to it but Ergo posted a photo of the payment request by CMC on their Twitter page at the Twitter handle ergo_platform.