{"id":5930,"date":"2024-05-01T09:29:11","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T09:29:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=5930"},"modified":"2024-05-01T09:29:11","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T09:29:11","slug":"cryptocurrency-exchange-founder-jailed-for-money-laundering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=5930","title":{"rendered":"Cryptocurrency exchange founder jailed for money laundering"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class='booster-block booster-read-block'>\n                <div class=\"twp-read-time\">\n                \t<i class=\"booster-icon twp-clock\"><\/i> <span>Read Time:<\/span>2 Minute, 14 Second                <\/div>\n\n            <\/div><p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Changpeng Zhao, the founder of the world\u2019s leading cryptocurrency exchange, was sentenced on Tuesday to four months in prison after pleading guilty to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2023\/11\/21\/investing\/binance-changpeng-zhao-treasury\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">money-laundering charges<\/a>\u00a0last year.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">The sentence, handed down in<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>a US federal court in Seattle, is far lighter than the three years prosecutors had argued for.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Prior to the sentencing hearing Tuesday, Zhao, who goes by CZ, apologized for mistakes he made as CEO of Binance, the crypto exchange he founded in 2017.<\/p>\n<div class=\"ad-slot-dynamic ad-slot-dynamic--1\">\n<div class=\"ad-slot\">\n<div class=\"ad-slot__feedback ad-feedback-link-container\">\n<div class=\"ad-feedback-link\">\n<div class=\"ad-feedback-link__label\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">\u201cWords cannot explain how deeply I regret my choices that result in me being before the Court,\u201d he said in a letter to the judge. \u201cRest assured that it will never happen again.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Binance agreed to pay more than $4 billion in fines and other penalties as part of a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2023\/11\/21\/investing\/binance-changpeng-zhao-treasury\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">coordinated settlement<\/a>\u00a0with the federal government last fall. The company admitted to engaging in anti-money laundering activities, unlicensed money transmitting and sanctions violations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Zhao, who is 47 and has a personal fortune of nearly $40 billion, according to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/billionaires\/profiles\/zhao-changpeng\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Bloomberg<\/a>, agreed to step down as CEO and pay $200 million in fines.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Following a multiyear investigation, US authorities in November said Binance \u2014 the world\u2019s largest crypto exchange \u2014 allowed bad actors on the platform, enabling transactions linked to child sex abuse, narcotics and terrorist financing.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Further, Binance did not have protocols to flag or report transactions for money-laundering risks, and employees were well aware that such an oversight would invite criminals to the platform. According to court documents, one Binance compliance staffer wrote:\u00a0\u201cWe need a banner \u2018is washing drug money too hard these days \u2013 come to binance we got cake for you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Zhao\u2019s sentencing comes just over a month after his former rival, Sam Bankman-Fried, was\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2024\/03\/28\/business\/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-sentencing\/index.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">sentenced to 25 years\u00a0<\/a>in federal prison for his role in a yearslong, multibillion-dollar fraud through FTX, which was the second largest exchange crypto exchange before its sudden collapse in the fall of 2022.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">The back-to-back sentencings underscore a harder line the Department of Justice has taken against financial crimes broadly and crypto in particular.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">Crypto investors and businesses have been keen to shake the industry\u2019s reputation as a financial system for criminals and pivot toward the mainstream.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">But crypto skeptics tend to view the entire $2 trillion industry with suspicion and say the DOJ hasn\u2019t done nearly enough to combat it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paragraph inline-placeholder\">\u201d\u2018Crime pays\u2019 is the message sent today\u201d by the Justice Department, Dennis Kelleher, CEO of the nonprofit Better Markets, said in statement Tuesday. \u201cIt didn\u2019t even charge CZ with money laundering; he was only charged with not having an anti-money laundering program. That\u2019s less than a slap on the wrist.\u201d<\/p>        <div class=\"booster-block booster-reactions-block\">\n            <div class=\"twp-reactions-icons\">\n                \n                <div class=\"twp-reacts-wrap\">\n                    <a react-data=\"be-react-1\" post-id=\"5930\" class=\"be-face-icons un-reacted\" href=\"javascript:void(0)\">\n                        <img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/wp-content\/plugins\/booster-extension\/\/assets\/icon\/happy.svg\" alt=\"Happy\">\n                    <\/a>\n                    <div class=\"twp-reaction-title\">\n                        Happy                    <\/div>\n                    <div class=\"twp-count-percent\">\n                                                    <span style=\"display: none;\" class=\"twp-react-count\">0<\/span>\n                        \n                                                <span class=\"twp-react-percent\"><span>0<\/span> %<\/span>\n                       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The sentence, handed down in\u00a0a&hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5931,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5930","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5930","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5930"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5930\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}