The Big Fight between WazirX and Binance: That's really what shook up the crypto market in 2025
Two names ringing bells in the crypto world are WazirX and Binance. WazirX- Binance: A Deal Was in the End of that Legal Battle. It had also sent people who invest in crypto in a state of utmost worry about what would happen with WazirX and Binance. What a mess for the crypto market in 2025. WazirX and Binance remain in the crypto market. News became the reason for the fight between WazirX and Binance in 2025. The further developments pertaining to WazirX and Binance will be interesting to see.
The Indian crypto market is crazy for everyone all the time. Full of uncertainties, full of tax problems. Lots of people are using it. So, the biggest thing that people have been talking about is a fight between WazirX and Binance. Those are two companies in the crypto world. At one point, they said they were going to do it for Indian crypto. Now, they're in a very dramatic lawsuit between WazirX and Binance. It's huge in the crypto world. People are waiting to see what happens with WazirX and Binance.
We shall know what's going on with WazirX. WazirX CEO Nischal Shetty said the fight over who owns WazirX is going to court. We will be discussing in detail what transpired and what it means for people in India who invest in WazirX. There will be more news about what happens next with WazirX and other similar platforms, like WazirX.
1. The Genesis: A Dream Turned Into a Nightmare
The story of a dream that people wanted to make real. This turned into a worst experience. The Genesis was supposed to be a thing, but it became a nightmare for everyone who was involved with The Genesis.
In November 2019, the crypto world was pretty excited when it heard that Binance, the world's leading crypto exchange, had acquired WazirX, India's popular crypto exchange. This, to them, was a deal for the Indian market and was thought of as a huge endorsement of the Indian market and crypto world in India. The fact that Binance, the world's leading crypto exchange was investing in WazirX, India's popular crypto exchange was thought of as a big sign that the Indian market was important to the crypto world.
It was a pretty deep integration between Binance and WazirX. People using WazirX could connect their accounts to Binance, sending and receiving money for free instantaneously. They could also use the fact that Binance is the biggest player in the world, to their advantage. For a really long time, most of the people and news thought that WazirX was a company that Binance owned.
The so-called "honeymoon phase" did not last long. It actually abruptly came to an end in August of 2022. That is when the Enforcement Directorate of India froze the assets of WazirX. They did this because of a case involving money laundering and WazirX. The Enforcement Directorate took this action against WazirX in August 2022.
2. The Big Question About Ownership: Who Really Owns Wazir?
This is an important question concerning Wazir, which we should ask ourselves. Essentially, it is a question of who owns Wazir. The question of ownership as regards Wazir is what makes it a deal. Who can claim ownership of Wazir?
Soon after the news about the ED probe broke, netizens started a heated debate over the same on Twitter. Changpeng Zhao, a.k.a CZ and Binance CEO at the time, made it clear amply. He had said Binance doesn't own WazirX. This is further to the deal to acquire WazirX in 2019, which was never actually completed. Well, Changpeng Zhao has made it clear that Binance is nothing to do with WazirX by association.
In response to this decision, Nischal Shetty, co-founder of WazirX, argues that Binance has taken over the property in the name of the domain name and AWS server. All of the aforementioned things are considered property. This tug-of-war between the owners confuses millions of people in India who are worried about the safety of their money in WazirX. Nischal Shetty and WazirX are trying to clear up the confusion about the safety of the funds in WazirX.
The Conflict Points:
Binance's stand is that they only provided wallet services and technology to WazirX, and that they did not actually own the company in control of WazirX, which is Zanmai Labs. All Binance did was provide them with tools they needed to operate. Binance didn't have any control over Zanmai Labs, which was the parent entity of WazirX.
What WazirX is saying here is that Binance is the company who actually possesses the assets, while Zanmai Labs is just a company who sorts out the legalities for Rupees to get converted into cryptocurrency in India. WazirX wants to make it clear Binance is in charge of the assets, while Zanmai Labs was in charge of Rupee to Crypto in India.
3. The Litigation-Entering Stage: A Point of No Return
It is now in the hands of the courts and the arbitrators, according to Shetty. This means the problem will not be fixed by talking over it on Twitter or private meetings. Now it is up to the legal authorities and the arbitrators to figure what to do with the conflict. The dispute now lies with the legal bodies and the arbitrators.
What happened in July 2024 at WazirX was terrible. A hacker had managed to get into the system. He got about 230 million dollars. This made the people in charge of WazirX sit and think, "What to do now." They knew they would need to take some steps that could help the customers who lost money. The big question is, since Binance is the owner of WazirX, whether Binance will help pay back the customers who were affected by the hack at WazirX.
When WazirX decides to take the issue to court they are probably trying to get an answer on who really owns the company. Then, if the court says that Binance is the owner of WazirX, the person responsible for the missing money might be someone else. This step will help WazirX determine who is in charge of WazirX. The courts decision is important because it will decide who is responsible for the missing funds at WazirX.
4. Impact on Indian Crypto Investors
This is a really bad situation for the Indian investor. Raj Kundra, a known Indian investor of Bitcoin, told this to Business Insider. He told Business Insider, "WazirX was thought to be the Indian exchange, like the best of the best. Now WazirX customers are having a lot of trouble.
- Frozen Withdrawals: The website, after being hacked and having to bear numerous problems, resorted to limiting or completely stopping the users from withdrawing their money. They did that to user deposits. The user deposits have been restricted because of these issues with Frozen Withdrawals.
- Loss of Trust: The thing is, there is not a lot of transparency between these two exchanges. This has caused people to lose trust in the crypto market in the country. Due to this, a lack of transparency has engulfed trust in people concerning the crypto market in the country.
- Liquidity Issues: When Binance stopped helping WazirX with wallets, WazirX had one big problem. People could hardly buy and sell WazirX at a price because WazirX, by itself as an exchange, didn't have enough money moving in and out of it. The WazirX liquidity was very low. People had a time trading WazirX.
This is going to be a long litigation phase. You have lawsuits involving companies like Binance, which is registered in so many countries, and WazirX, actually Zanmai Labs, in India; these things drag on and on for years and years. This is going to be something Binance and WazirX are going to be fighting for some time.
5. Questions of Security and Custody Orders
Some of the things about these cases involve who's in charge. The question is, who had the keys to the money that was supposed to be private? The question primarily we need to know is, who controlled the keys to these funds that were supposed to be private?
It said that they and Liminal did things in tandem with each other by having multiple signees set up, and sometimes this can be sloppy. Simultaneously, WazirX said that the Binance was in charge of most the money and assets that WazirX made. They say Binance has a story that the people in charge of WazirX got to make the final decisions on things.
The thing that happened serves as a lesson for cryptocurrency enthusiasts: If one doesn't have the keys to their money, it's not really theirs. The problem with depending on companies that control money exchanges is that they can be a weak point. It happened again. That's really fair to show people should be careful when they make use of Centralized Exchanges. People into cryptocurrency have to remember that once they do not have control over their cryptocurrency, they do not own their cryptocurrency.
6. Regulatory Scrutiny in India
The Government of India and the Reserve Bank of India have always been skeptical about crypto. This issue between WazirX and Binance will further give them reasons to feel crypto in India needs to be tightly regulated, or maybe even banned. The Indian government and the Reserve Bank of India will use this situation with WazirX-Binance to make a stronger case for controlling crypto in India.
The entire development regarding the case is being monitored by the Financial Intelligence Unit. For obvious reasons, the court case between WazirX and Binance has assumed great importance and would determine as to how foreign exchanges would work in India and the level of identification they would have to make as to who really owns them in the market. The Financial Intelligence Unit is keeping an eye on what exactly happens with the WazirX-Binance case.
7. What Is Going To Happen In The Future
The future is what happens next. There are a few different paths the case can take as the case goes through the system. The case will go on to people and places in the judicial system. The system contains a number of ways the case can go.
Scenario A: Financial Settlement
In which all parties to the dispute agree; there is a settlement where the parties agree on an award of money. The parties will then use this settlement to get rid of their issues. In this scenario, the people involved can come up with a plausible financial solution, which is the financial settlement. Both sides know that a long fight in court will make either of their sides look worse, so they opt to pay the users to try to settle the matter once and for all. Both sides can try to move on from this problem.
Scenario B: Binance Wins
According to the court, it was the responsibility of the people in charge of buying WazirX, which they did not complete. The blame for the various problems that occurred is to be placed at the doorstep of WazirX, also known as Zanmai Labs, and this might mean WazirX will need to make some major changes.
Scenario C: WazirX comes out on top
The court says that Binance really does own the USDT that's, on WazirX. The intervention of Binance for WazirX, in this case, has to be done. Probably pay back the users from the SAFU fund. It is observed that Binance needs to take over the users of WazirX and give away their money from the SAFU.
Conclusion: Turning Point for Crypto
This is not a case of two companies fighting with each other. Actually, WazirX versus Binance is a huge fight. The WazirX vs Binance case is about saving the cryptocurrency industry. The cryptocurrency industry of India is very important, and this case, WazirX versus Binance, is a fight to save it. The thing is, when things aren't controlled, that can be really bad. This is what we saw with the WazirX vs Binance case. It showed us that we need to have rules in place. We need to have agreements that make sense so that what happened with the WazirX vs Binance case doesn't happen again.
The crypto community awaits the aftermath. Can Nischal Shetty and WazirX truly have their way with the big company Binance, or will this problem-being who owns what-leaves users of crypto in a tight spot? One thing is for sure: it's time to bid adieu to "trustingly" dealing in an exchange without concrete, undisputed proof of ownership or assets.