Who Is Changpeng Zhao? Pros Complete Guides [2024]

Changpeng Zhao, known as “CZ,” is the founder and former chief executive officer (CEO) of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. Zhao founded Binance in 2017, which quickly grew in daily trading volume to more than $20 billion. An avid Bitcoin enthusiast, he amassed a fortune in cryptocurrency, but most of his net worth was due to his holdings in Binance Holdings Ltd. As of March 2024, Zhao is the world’s 35th richest person with an estimated net worth of $39.6 billion.

On Nov. 21, 2023, Zhao pleaded guilty to money laundering–related charges in the United States. As part of his plea, he resigned from his leadership position within his firm and agreed to pay a penalty of $50 million. But the resolution of his legal troubles did not conclude with this plea agreement. As the New York Times reported, federal sentencing guidelines suggest that Zhao could be sentenced to as much as 18 months in prison; prosecutors have not ruled out the option of seeking a more severe sentence, as indicated by statements from senior officials at the Justice Department. Sentencing is now expected in late April.

Binance itself announced in a Nov. statement that it had “reached resolutions with the U.S. Department of Justice, Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Office of Foreign Assets Control, and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network related to their investigations into historical registration, compliance, and sanctions issues.” In addition to its own guilty plea, it agreed to pay more than $4.3 billion in fines and forfeitures.

Binance said in its announcement that Richard Teng, formerly the company’s global head of regional markets, was taking over as CEO effective immediately.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Changpeng “CZ” Zhao is the founder and former chief executive officer of Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.
• He resigned on Nov. 21, 2023 as part of an agreement with the U.S. government involving money laundering violations.
• Zhao was born in China and emigrated to Canada in 1989.
• Binance started in Singapore but was relocated several times due to regulations, before becoming a “headquarter-less” company.
• Zhao reportedly has a net worth of more than $30 billion.

Changpeng Zhao and the Collapse of Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX

Changpeng Zhao was prominently in the news in November 2022 when rival exchange FTX faced a liquidity crisis. Zhao at first stopped all trading of FTX’s native FTT token. Then, as FTX’s troubles worsened, Zhao announced that he was in talks with FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried to acquire FTX. The next day, Zhao said Binance was dropping its takeover bid after due diligence uncovered a shortfall of more than $6 billion and raised questions about FTX’s handling of customer funds. Two days later, FTX— once valued at $32 billion—filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.

In announcing Zhao’s and Binance’s guilty pleas on Nov. 21, 2023, U.S. Attorney General Merrick B. Garland linked the two men’s cases. “In just the past month,” he said, “the Justice Department has successfully prosecuted the CEOs of two of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges in two separate criminal cases. The message here should be clear: using new technology to break the law does not make you a disruptor, it makes you a criminal.”

Early Life and Education

Changpeng Zhao was born in the Jiangsu province of China in 1977. His parents were teachers, and his father was once a professor at the University of Science and Technology in Hefei, a leading Chinese university at the time.

The 1980s in communist China was a tumultuous time for Zhao and his family. In a Binance blog post, Zhao writes of how he fled China at age 12 following the Tiananmen Square massacre.

“On Aug. 6, 1989, my mother and I left China and emigrated thousands of miles away to Canada. For those who know Chinese history, this is two months after the events of June 4, 1989,” wrote Zhao.

Zhao and his family waited outside the Canadian embassy for several days for an expedited visa to leave the country following the bloody crackdown on those critical of the Chinese Communist Party.

“I remember the line outside the Canadian embassy was three days long. We had to take shifts at night to keep our position in the queue,” Zhao recalled. “It changed my life forever and opened up endless possibilities for me.”

Zhao spent his teenage years in Vancouver, where he worked various jobs, including at McDonald’s as a burger cook.

Even before Zhao enrolled in university, the math whiz expressed an interest in computer programming courses. He later went on to study computer science at McGill University in Montreal.

After university, he interned for a subcontractor on the Tokyo Stock Exchange before working for Bloomberg Tradebook in New York for several years, where he developed software to match trade orders.

Career and Founding of Binance

After his graduation from McGill, Zhao took on work as a contractor for the Tokyo Stock Exchange, then became the head of Tradebook Futures Development at Bloomberg Professional Services from 2001 to 2005. He eventually joined some friends to start an information technology (IT) consulting company, and moved to Singapore to launch Fusion Systems.

Changpeng Zhao also started a few more ventures, including Bijie Tech, a provider of cloud-based services to exchanges. While the business grew, China began cracking down on cryptocurrency exchanges in March 2017, and Zhao contemplated launching his own crypto exchange. 

Binance launched in July 2017, but China banned all crypto exchanges in September 2017. Zhao was forced to relocate, but instead of simply finding another country to operate in, the company went fully remote.

Binance quickly grew to become one of the biggest crypto exchanges by daily trade volume. It now operates globally, with $76 billion daily trading volume and 90 million customers worldwide. Zhao, who holds a majority stake in Binance Holdings, has experienced a significant increase in his net worth over time. During the cryptocurrency bull run in 2021, his net worth reached a peak of nearly $100 billion. In 2023, Zhao’s net worth increased by almost $25 billion by the year’s end, coinciding with a period when Bitcoin’s value more than doubled.

Personal Life

Changpeng Zhao shares little about his personal life online, though a recent profile revealed more details about his childhood. 

Changpeng Zhao is private about his personal life, but a recent profile shed light on his upbringing. He faced significant challenges from a young age, notably when his family moved to Canada after his father was exiled for his intellectual views when Zhao was just 8 years old. The move to Vancouver opened up new opportunities for him, including his initial forays into programming and various part-time jobs that would later influence his career path.

Changpeng Zhao is not currently married. Despite his considerable financial success, he chooses a minimalist lifestyle, avoiding the usual symbols of wealth, like owning a house or a car.

What Is Changpeng Zhao’s Net Worth?

Changpeng Zhao’s net worth is reportedly more than $30 billion, though it fluctuates with the valuation of his company, Binance. Changpeng Zhao also may have significant crypto holdings or other assets, but this information is not disclosed publicly.

Did Binance Buy FTX?

No, but almost. On Nov. 8, 2022, Binance signed a nonbinding letter of intent (LOI) to purchase FTX, according to Zhao’s announcement on Twitter. After a day of due diligence, the deal was called off, and Binance did not end up purchasing FTX. Zhao reportedly called former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried “one of the greatest fraudsters in history” on Twitter. FTX later filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

What Is Changpeng Zhao’s Twitter Account?

Changpeng Zhao shares his thoughts on his popular X (formerly Twitter) account; his handle is @cz_binance. On Nov. 21, 2023, he announced his departure from Binance in a largely upbeat post on the platform, saying that as a “next step I will take a break first. I have not had a single day of real (phone off) break for the last 6 and half years.”

Changpeng Zhao Founded Binance

In 2005, Changpeng Zhao moved back to China and tried his hand at several different tech startups before getting involved in crypto and founding Binance.

“I was a serial entrepreneur looking to build a successful start-up before I understood my passion,” he says of his life before Binance.

In September 2017, the Chinese government banned cryptocurrency exchanges from operating in China only a few weeks after Zhao launched Binance. Nearly 30 years after fleeing China for the first time, Zhao was forced to depart again.

The move hardly slowed Binance’s growth, and by 2021, a peak year for crypto, Binance reportedly handled more than $34 trillion in trading volume.

However, it hasn’t always been smooth sailing. Binance has been embroiled in several notable incidents.

In May 2019, Binance had $40 million worth of Bitcoin (BTC) stolen in a hack. But the episode ended well, with customers being fully compensated.

Most of Binance’s tussles have come from regulators. Last year, the world’s largest exchange was banned by U.K. regulators—the same year it faced a money laundering probe in the U.S.

For regulatory reasons, Binance has a U.S. subsidiary, Binance.US, a separate offshoot from the main Binance.

Perhaps to appease regulators, Zhao switched tracks last year and announced the company was ditching its nomadic structure.

“I am a technology entrepreneur, and we are making this pivot into a fully-regulated financial business,” he said of his plans to put down roots and establish a formal, fully compliant business.

Despite these plans, the company remains unconventional, without a standard company structure and no official headquarters.

Binance and the Collapse of FTX

Investors around the world are concerned that Binance’s dominant share of the global crypto exchange market poses big risks to the industry. These risks have only grown after the implosion of FTX.

In fact, CZ played a major role in the decline and fall of Sam Bankman-Fried’s crypto empire.

In early November 2022, CoinDesk reported that the balance sheet of Alameda Research, Bankman-Fried’s trading firm, was propped up by FTX’s native token, FTT. Zhao tweeted that he was planning to sell off Binance’s position in FTT “due to recent revelations that have come to light.”

Changpeng Zhao’s company had invested in FTX three years earlier. In 2021, it cashed out its equity in return for a $2.1 billion payout. Crucially, part of this payout was denominated in FTT.

Ultimately, this move led broader crypto markets to realize that the low-liquidity FTT token was propping up an insolvent FTX-Alameda ecosystem.

A run on the bank occurred, and customers scrambled to get their money out of FTX. But by that time, the money wasn’t there, as it had been sent by FTX to Alameda for trading purposes—trades that didn’t end well.

Changpeng Zhao stepped in, announcing Binance would acquire FTX in a development that stunned markets. But he pulled out of the deal following a swift due diligence process. He realized that the scale of the damage at FTX—an $8 billion hole in the company’s balance sheet—was too great.

Crypto’s No. 1 Player

Changpeng Zhao was seen as the unquestioned leader of crypto since the FTX debacle.

“Well played; you won,” Bankman-Fried tweeted out to Zhao, although it is clear that the debacle was caused by the nefarious actions of Bankman-Fried himself, rather than Zhao.

At the time being the kingpin of the largest company in the space, Zhao was quite vocal that exchanges needed to promote transparency and help mend their broken reputations.

The Binance founder pushed for a proof-of-reserves model in the wake of the FTX scandal. Under the system, customers’ assets could be proven through the use of a public blockchain.

But critics say that even Binance remains worryingly opaque. Without knowing Binance’s liabilities, having proof of reserves doesn’t matter much.

The Future of Binance

The future of Binance will invariably be tied to the future of cryptocurrency as a whole, such is the size of the company.

Regulation will no doubt come in hard. It’s an eventuality that is vitally needed in the industry, given the numerous scandals that have rocked the space.

Binance’s stranglehold of market share is also a concern no matter what way you swing it.

Investors will close their eyes and pray that Binance is better run than the myriad of other centralized players that have been embroiled in scandals. They will hope that nothing is going on behind the scenes. The unfortunate truth is that right now, however, that is all that they can do—hope.

The Bottom Line

Changpeng Zhao, known as “CZ,” founded Binance, which rapidly grew to be the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world by daily trading volume. With a net worth estimated at $39.6 billion as of March 2024, Zhao’s story reflects the fast-paced and unpredictable world of cryptocurrency. His journey took a significant turn when he admitted guilt to charges related to money laundering in the United States, leading to his stepping down and a $50 million fine. This event emphasizes the importance of following regulatory laws in the crypto industry.

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