jakiro
Jessy, bitchain vision
On August 13, 2025, OKB prices soared by more than 180% in a short period of time, soaring from a high of about $47 to $141, setting a record high.
The market started with OKX’s announcement that it had destroyed 65 million OKBs and locked the total supply to 21 million.At the same time, OKX upgraded the X Layer chain, greatly optimized the transaction speed and fees, and at the same time exchanged the old OKTChain, OKT tokens for OKB.
Why is OKB destroyed?Is it because OK had to divest OKB in order to comply with the rules before going public?What will XLayer develop in the future?Does OKB still have the driving force for upward development?
Destruction is to take off the platform currency outer cover and list in compliance
OKX announced that it would destroy more than 65 million OKBs, permanently locking the total supply of OKBs to 21 million.This move is the most direct reason for the surge in token prices.
At the same time, OKX announced that the X Layer chain has completed an upgrade called “PP upgrade”, connected to the latest Polygon CDK technology, improved the network to 5,000 TPS, reduced the natural gas fee to almost zero, and greatly improved Ethereum compatibility, integrating into OKX Wallet, Exchange and OKX Pay.In addition, OKTChain will be retired, OKT transactions will be stopped on August 13, and OKT will be automatically exchanged for OKB at the average price.
This large-scale destruction is not the first time that OKB has carried out token destruction.OKB’s destruction mechanism has been set since its birth.Early destruction was mainly based on the transaction fees of the OKX platform, and a certain proportion of profit would be taken out every quarter to repurchase and destroy OKB.For example, in the last two quarters, the 28th round of destruction on June 19, 2025 destroyed 42,437,632 OKBs, and the 27th round of destruction on March 14, 2025 destroyed 31,158,862 OKBs were destroyed.
In addition to regular destruction, OKB has also carried out several large-scale destructions in history.For example, in 2020, OKX announced the destruction of uncirculated OKBs, gradually reducing the total circulation in the market.These destructions are all designed to increase the scarcity of OKB and thus increase its value.The destruction of 65 million pieces is the largest in history, directly pushing OKB to the same total of 21 million pieces as Bitcoin.
Projects choose to actively destroy tokens, generally in order to adjust the total circulation by destroying tokens, thereby regulating inflation and managing market value.However, OKB’s destruction is not just for the purpose of managing the market value of the currency price, but for the market value management is only a superficial reason.Many people in the industry believe that this large-scale destruction and ecological integration are the strategic preparations for OKX’s future listing plan.
For example, Hashkey Exchange’s platform currency HSK has now turned to its public chain tokens, and the reason is to seek listing.
The total supply of OKB is permanently locked at 21 million pieces and divested from the OKX platform operations, which is seen as an important step for OKX in compliance.After this series of actions, OKB has changed from platform coins to X Layer’s public chain coins.
Previously, there was news that OKX was going to go public in the United States, so it must meet strict regulatory requirements.If the platform tokens are directly linked to the company’s operating profits, it will undoubtedly be regarded as securities by US regulators, which will bring huge resistance to listing.
Through this operation, OKX positioned OKB as an ecological token, rather than a simple platform equity token, which undoubtedly better meets compliance requirements.
OKB’s future depends on X Layer
2025 is actually the year when OKX’s compliance starts again in the United States.
It has established a US subsidiary OKX.US and registered as Money Services Business (MSB), and initiated legal operations in accordance with the compliance requirements of the United States federal and states. Its headquarters is in San Jose, California, and appointed Roshan Robert as the CEO of OKX United States.On April 15, 2025, OKX US CEO officially announced the official launch of the OKX centralized cryptocurrency exchange and OKX Web3 wallet in the United States. Existing OKCoin customers will be seamlessly moved to the OKX platform.
In compliance initiatives, it has added a KYC verification process and has enabled geo-blocking, and has launched an automated review system for anti-money laundering and combating terrorism financing.And continue to seek compliance on the license, and actively contact FinCEN, CFTC, and SEC.This series of behaviors actually marks that OKX is seeking long-term compliance development in the United States.It is reported that it is seeking to go public in the United States.This separation of OKB from the platform is undoubtedly another step in clearing the obstacles for its listing.
So will OKB, as the X Layer ecosystem token, have a future?
At present, OKX’s upgrade and ecological integration of X Layer show that it may be the focus of future development.As OKX’s self-developed L2 network, X Layer has a strong technical foundation.It inherits the high performance and security of the OKX exchange and greatly optimizes transaction speed and fees after the upgrade.
At present, X Layer can directly utilize OKX’s existing traffic, which may provide a huge advantage for its early development.At the same time, OKX may continue to inject funds and resources into the X Layer ecosystem through investment, incubation, etc., to attract more high-quality projects to settle in.
OKB may become an important payment and transaction medium in the X Layer ecosystem.Users may use OKB when making transactions on X Layer, paying DApp service fees, etc.Of course, OKB may also be used as ecological incentives, governance voting, etc.
However, the competition in the L2 track is fierce at present, and the top L2 such as Arbitrum and Optimism have formed a strong ecological barrier.X Layer also needs to continue to innovate to stand out from the competition.According to DeFiLlama data, X Layer currently ranks 122 in the public chain, which is far behind the top Layer2.
Therefore, the market value of OKB in the future depends on how much effort OKX spends and what height it is to push X Layer to, and where does OKB stand in this ecosystem?
At present, OKB is indeed more like a emotionally hyped Meme, especially when it is no longer a platform currency, but becomes a public chain currency. Although 3/4 of the tokens have been destroyed, we can no longer use platform currency to price it.
