Changpeng Zhao, widely known as CZ, is a Chinese-born Canadian entrepreneur who founded the cryptocurrency exchange Binance in 2017 and led it as chief executive until November 2023. Under his leadership Binance became the largest crypto exchange in the world by trading volume, and Zhao became one of the most influential and wealthy figures in the industry. He stepped down as part of a settlement with US authorities in which he pleaded guilty to failing to maintain an effective anti-money laundering programme.
Zhao's career mirrors the rise of crypto exchanges from small start-ups to global firms with tens of millions of users, and the regulatory reckoning that followed. Binance also built its own blockchain network and token, BNB, and an investment arm, Binance Labs. He remains a large shareholder in the company.
Changpeng Zhao in plain terms
Changpeng Zhao built Binance, a website and app where people buy and sell cryptocurrencies, into the biggest business of its kind within a few years. He did this by moving very fast, offering a huge range of coins and serving customers in almost every country, often before the rules in those countries were clear.
That speed came at a price. US prosecutors found that Binance had not done enough to check who its customers were or to stop criminals and people in sanctioned countries from using it. Zhao admitted to breaking US anti-money laundering law, paid a large fine, left his job as boss and spent four months in a US prison in 2024.
Early life and career
Zhao was born in Jiangsu province, China, in 1977, and moved with his family to Vancouver, Canada, as a teenager. He studied computer science at McGill University in Montreal and worked on trading software, including for the Tokyo Stock Exchange and at Bloomberg Tradebook. He became involved in crypto in 2013, working briefly at the wallet provider Blockchain.info and then as chief technology officer of the exchange OKCoin.
Founding and growth of Binance
Zhao launched Binance in July 2017, funded partly through an initial coin offering of the BNB token. Within months it was among the largest exchanges by volume. The company had no fixed headquarters for much of its history, operating through entities in several countries. It expanded into derivatives, its own blockchain networks, the Binance Launchpad token-sale platform and a US-dollar stablecoin, BUSD, issued with Paxos. Zhao was a visible public figure, active on social media, and his comments could move markets. In November 2022 his public statements about selling FTX's token preceded the collapse of that exchange, after which Binance briefly signed and then abandoned a deal to buy it.
US prosecution and sentence
In November 2023, Binance and Zhao reached settlements with the US Department of Justice, the Treasury's FinCEN and OFAC, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission. Binance pleaded guilty to violations including failing to maintain an effective AML program under the Bank Secrecy Act and sanctions violations, and agreed to pay about $4.3 billion, one of the largest corporate penalties in US history. Zhao personally pleaded guilty to a Bank Secrecy Act violation, agreed to a $50 million fine and resigned as chief executive; Richard Teng succeeded him. On 30 April 2024 a federal judge in Seattle sentenced Zhao to four months in prison, and he was released in September 2024. Separately, the Securities and Exchange Commission sued Binance and Zhao in June 2023 over alleged securities violations; that case was dismissed in 2025. In October 2025, President Donald Trump granted Zhao a pardon.
Later activities and assessment
After stepping down, Zhao said he would focus on education, investing and philanthropy, including an online learning project, and Binance's investment arm was renamed YZi Labs in 2025. Supporters credit him with building a highly efficient platform that brought crypto to millions of users worldwide, including in countries with weak banking systems. Critics argue that Binance's early growth relied on weak know-your-customer checks and regulatory avoidance, a view largely confirmed by the 2023 guilty pleas. His case is widely cited as a turning point in how US authorities enforce money laundering rules against crypto exchanges. It showed that founders of offshore platforms could be held personally liable for compliance failures, and it pushed other large exchanges to strengthen customer checks, appoint compliance monitors and seek licences in the countries where they operate.