{"id":2799,"date":"2024-05-01T15:38:34","date_gmt":"2024-05-01T15:38:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/01\/changpeng-zhao-former-boss-of-worlds-largest-crypto-exchange-binance-jailed-for-allowing-money-laundering\/"},"modified":"2024-05-01T15:38:34","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T15:38:34","slug":"changpeng-zhao-former-boss-of-worlds-largest-crypto-exchange-binance-jailed-for-allowing-money-laundering","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/2024\/05\/01\/changpeng-zhao-former-boss-of-worlds-largest-crypto-exchange-binance-jailed-for-allowing-money-laundering\/","title":{"rendered":"Changpeng Zhao: Former boss of world\u2019s largest crypto exchange Binance jailed for allowing money laundering"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The former boss of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange has been jailed for four months for allowing money laundering.<\/p>\n

The sentence was handed down to Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, nicknamed CZ, after he pleaded guilty to breaching US anti-money laundering laws designed to prevent terrorist financing and funds going to sanctioned countries.<\/p>\n

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The prison term was far less than sought by US prosecutors who wanted a three-year term – twice the maximum 18 months recommended under federal sentencing guidelines – to be tough on the man once thought to be the most powerful person in the crypto world.<\/p>\n

The defence had called for probation with no prison time for their client. A $50m (\u00a340m) fine has already been paid by Zhao.<\/p>\n

Despite the massive fine, he remains a billionaire and the wealthiest crypto executive, according to Forbes, with magazine putting his wealth at $33bn (\u00a326.4bn).<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n

Zhao apologised before his sentencing at a court in Seattle, saying: “I failed here. I deeply regret my failure and I am sorry.”<\/p>\n

But district judge Richard Jones told him: “You had the wherewithal, the finance capabilities, and the people power to make sure that every single regulation had to be complied with, and so you failed at that opportunity.”<\/p>\n

He is the second major crypto boss to go to prison. Last month, the founder of FTX Sam Bankman-Fried was sentenced to 25 years<\/strong> for stealing billions of dollars from the now-bankrupt crypto exchange.<\/p>\n

Bankman-Fried has appealed against his conviction and his sentence.<\/p>\n

A ‘wild west’ model<\/strong><\/p>\n

Zhao stepped down<\/strong> from his role at Binance in November after he and the company admitted evading requirements under the US Bank Secrecy Act.<\/p>\n

The company agreed to a $4.3bn (\u00a33.4bn) penalty as prosecutors said it used a “wild west” model that failed to report 100,000 suspicious transactions involving terrorist groups.<\/p>\n

Prosecutors had also said Binance supported the sale of child sexual abuse material and received the proceeds of ransomware cyberattacks.<\/p>\n

The US Justice Department brought the case as part of its clamp down on criminal activity within cryptocurrency, best known for Bitcoin.<\/p>\n

Binance is also being investigated and sued by another US agency<\/strong>, the Securities and Exchange Commission.<\/p>\n

The company had once processed about two-thirds of all cryptocurrency transactions.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

This post appeared first on sky.com<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The former boss of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange has been jailed for four months…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2800,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2799","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2799","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2799"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2799\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2799"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2799"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailywashingtoninsider.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2799"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}