One Binance Saga Comes to a Close

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao leaves the U.S. District Court on Nov. 21 in Seattle. Photo by David Ryder/Getty.

Just when it felt like crypto could coast into Thanksgiving with OpenAI drama dominating headlines, U.S. officials barged in with a settlement in long-running investigations into Binance.

The deal is on one hand a seismic shift for the world’s biggest crypto exchange. (You can view our updated Binance org chart here.) Its founder Changpeng Zhao pleaded guilty to violating U.S. anti-money laundering laws in a Seattle courtroom on Tuesday and agreed to resign from Binance. He’s been replaced by Richard Teng, most recently Binance’s head of regional markets, Zhao and Teng announced on X. Before joining Binance in 2021, Teng served as the CEO of the Financial Services Regulatory Authority at the Abu Dhabi Global Market and was the chief regulatory officer at the Singapore Exchange.