Binance is a cryptocurrency exchange that is the largest exchange in the world in terms of the daily trading volume of cryptocurrencies.[2] It was founded in 2017 and is registered in the Cayman Islands.
Binance was founded by Changpeng Zhao, a developer who had previously created high-frequency trading software. Binance was initially based in China but later moved its headquarters out of China following the Chinese government's increasing regulation of cryptocurrency.
In 2021, Binance was put under investigation by both the United States Department of Justice and the Internal Revenue Service on allegations of money laundering and tax offenses. The UK's Financial Conduct Authority ordered Binance to stop all regulated activity in the United Kingdom in June 2021.[6]
In 2021, Binance shared client data, including names and addresses, with the Russian government.[7]
CEO Changpeng Zhao had previously founded Fusion Systems in 2005 in Shanghai; the company built high-frequency trading systems for stockbrokers. In 2013, he joined Blockchain.info as the third member of the cryptocurrency wallet's team. He also worked at OKCoin as CTO for less than a year, a platform for spot trading between fiat and digital assets.[8]
The company was founded in China but moved its servers and headquarters out of China and into Japan in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.[9]
In January 2018 it was the largest cryptocurrency exchange with a market capitalization of $1.3 billion,[10] a title it has retained as of April 2021, despite competition from Coinbase, among others.[11]
In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in Malta after stricter regulations in Japan and China.[12] In April 2018, Binance signed a memorandum of understanding with the government of Bermuda.[13] Months later, a similar memorandum was signed with the Malta Stock Exchange to develop a platform for trading security tokens.[14] In 2019, the company announced Binance Jersey, an independent entity from its parent Binance.com exchange, with the aim to expand its European influence. Jersey-based exchange offers fiat-to-cryptocurrency pairs, including the Euro and the British pound.[15]
In August 2018, Binance along with three other big exchanges raised $32 million for a stablecoin project. The idea of stablecoins is to provide a cryptocurrency without the notorious volatility of Bitcoin and other popular digital assets.[16]
In January 2019, Binance announced that it had partnered with Israel-based payment processor Simplex to enable cryptocurrency purchases with debit and credit cards, including Visa and Mastercard. The purchases are subject to Simplex's local bank policies and are limited to Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin, and Ripple's XRP.[
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