Possible jail terms and leadership changes await Binance and ex-CEO Zhao after the court fines them $2.7 billion in the CFTC money laundering case.
According to a fresh report, the CFTC case that Binance and its former CEO ChangPeng Zhao are facing has taken a new turn. The court imposed a $2.7 billion punishment on the corporation, while former CEO Zhao was compelled to pay $150 million to the CFTC on an individual basis. The CFTC had initiated a money laundering prosecution against them, which led to this.
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois accepted the CFTC-Binance settlement. The court asked Binance to “disgorge $1.35 billion of ill-gotten transaction fees” and pay the commission an additional $1.35 billion in fines.
In addition, the CFTC clarified that “Binance, Binance Holdings (IE) Limited, and Binance (Services) Holdings Limited, all owned by Changpeng Zhao, have been sanctioned by the court for the settlement that was previously announced. The order includes a permanent injunction, a civil monetary penalty, and equitable relief.”
Separately, the court ordered Samuel Lim, who was Binance’s previous top compliance officer, to pay a civil monetary penalty of $1.5 million. Lim is accused of “aiding and abetting Binance’s violations” and participating in operations outside of the US to willfully avoid or try to avoid U.S. law obligations, which led to this sentence.
Officials charged the business and its creator, Zhao, with “willful evasion of federal law and operating an illegal digital asset derivatives exchange” in March 2023. Binance and Zhao finally entered guilty pleas last month after a protracted legal battle with the CFTC over anti-money laundering regulations. After settling for $4.3 billion, Zhao resigned as CEO and introduced Richard Teng, who had previously served as Binance’s Global Head of Regional Markets, as the new CEO.
Reports indicate that Zhao might face a jail term of up to 10 years as a result. Despite Zhao’s intentions to visit his family in the United Arab Emirates, he was barred from doing so in a court document that said he was a “flight risk.” “The defense claims that Mr. Zhao faces merely a “short” sentence and has no incentive to flee,” wrote ex-SEC officer John Reed Stark on X, citing the court judgment.
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