Binance: Can the biggest crypto exchange reform itself?

The company's CEO pleads guilty to money laundering

Changpeng Zhao.
Changpeng Zhao is the richest person in the cryptocurrency industry
(Image credit: Zed Jameson / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

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Terrorists, hackers, drug dealers and pedophiles — meet the customers of the world’s largest crypto exchange, said Allyson Versprille and David Voreacos in Bloomberg. Binance "turned a blind eye" to a staggering number of criminal failures, prosecutors said last week in announcing the exchange’s $4.3 billion guilty plea on money-laundering charges. Regulators found chats from Binance’s own compliance chief joking about the exchange "being used to funnel money to Hamas." Bitcoin transactions were commonplace among other terror organizations, including al Qaida and ISIS. Millions of transactions were conducted by people living in Iran, Syria and Cuba, in violation of U.S. sanctions. More than $100 million sat in Binance wallets traced to a Russian darknet marketplace that "sold hacking software, fake IDs and illegal drugs." And more than 1,000 transactions took place involving three marketplaces that dealt in child pornography. As part of the settlement, chief executive Changpeng Zhao agreed to step down and pay a $50 million fine.

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