Binance announced that it will remove Alpaca Finance (ALPACA) – along with PDA, WING and VIB – from its platform on May 2, 2025 . In its official notice, Binance said these tokens “failed to meet required criteria” on volume, liquidity, team activity or compliance with regulations . In short, ALPACA no longer met the exchange’s listing standards, so all spot and futures trading will end by early May.
ALPACA’s Price Jumped Instead of Crashing
Most delisted tokens tumble in price – but ALPACA did the opposite. Right after the news, ALPACA’s market price surged sharply. One report found ALPACA spiked about +71% in a day, with trading volume jumping by over 400% . Some Binance users even noted up to +100–150% gains in 24h. By contrast, the other three delisted coins fell 15–30% .
Why the pump? Traders suspect a short squeeze or exit pump. Many were shorting ALPACA expecting a crash, but a flood of buying (or even a coordinated whale buy-in) drove the price up, forcing short sellers to cover (buy back) their positions. An analyst on X (Twitter) warned that the move looked manipulated: ALPACA “rised to over 100% [and] liquidated some heavy shorters, heavy manipulation out there” . In short, people rushed to buy ALPACA, and the sudden rally blew out bearish bets.
Extreme Funding Rates and Liquidations
The futures funding rate on ALPACA/USDT turned deeply negative, reflecting this frenzy. (A negative funding means shorts pay longs.) For example, on April 25 the Binance ALPACA perpetual had an –1.24% funding rate – extraordinarily low for any crypto. In fact, data trackers show ALPACA’s funding briefly hit single-digit negatives (e.g. –8.43% over an 8‑hour period). Such a negative rate means bearish traders were heavily leveraged, paying huge fees to the bullish side.
As a result, many shorts were liquidated. According to coinalyze data, roughly $13.4 million worth of ALPACA short positions were auto-liquidated in the past 24 hours, versus only $2.5 million in long positions . In other words, a large number of bearish futures traders got “wrecked” as the price shot up and funding costs piled up. This avalanche of liquidations helped fuel the rally even higher.
Key Figures (approximate)
Delisting date: May 2, 2025 (ALPACA/USDT trading ends) .
ALPACA price move: up ~70%+ in 24h after news .
Funding rate: about –1.24% (per 8h, Apr 25) (shorts pay longs; recent highs ~–8.4%).
Liquidations (24h): ~$13.4M of shorts vs $2.5M of longs .
Traders are now very cautious. The big question is whether ALPACA’s pump can hold or if it’s a “final surge” before collapse. Binance itself warned users to manage risk and close positions before delisting . In any case, the strange combination of a delisting notice and a massive price rally has made ALPACA one of the most volatile plays in crypto right now.
Sources: Official Binance delisting notice and analysis ; crypto news reports ; funding and liquidation data .