Crypto crunch amid SEC suit

The US affiliate of Binance said it is halting dollar deposits, while trading platform Robinhood Markets said it is delisting some crypto tokens, after securities regulators stepped up their crackdown on the crypto sector.

Binance.US, the purportedly independent partner of Binance, said in a tweet Thursday that its banking partners are preparing to stop dollar withdrawal channels as early as Tuesday, after the Securities and Exchange Commission asked a court to freeze its assets. Customers have until Tuesday to withdraw their funds.

The development is the latest blow for the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange and raises questions about whether its US operation can survive the SEC lawsuit, which alleges Binance manipulated its trading volumes and comingled customer assets, among other civil charges that it denies.

On Friday, Robinhood said it is removing three cryptocurrency tokens from its platform that the SEC identified as securities in its lawsuit against Binance and a separate action it filed against Coinbase the following day.

The SEC sued Binance, its CEO and founder Changpeng Zhao (right), and Binance.US’s operation on Monday, alleging that Binance had engaged in a “web of deception.”