President Donald Trump has granted a pardon to Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, who established the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange and served jail time for failing to prevent criminals from using the platform for illicit activities such as child sex abuse, drug trafficking, and terrorism.
Zhao had previously sought a pardon from Trump. He is closely connected to World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture that the Republican president and his sons Eric and Donald Jr. initiated in September.
Trump’s latest financial disclosure report indicates he earned over $57 million last year from World Liberty Financial, which has introduced USD1, a stablecoin tied at a 1-to-1 ratio with the U.S. dollar.
World Liberty Financial recently announced that an investment fund in the United Arab Emirates would be utilizing $2 billion worth of USD1 to acquire a stake in Binance. Zhao has also publicly stated that he had requested a pardon from Trump to overturn his conviction.
The pardon caps a monthslong effort by Zhao, a billionaire commonly known as CZ in the crypto world and one of the biggest names in the industry. He and Binance have been key supporters of some of the Trump family’s crypto enterprises.
“Deeply grateful for today’s pardon and to President Trump for upholding America’s commitment to fairness, innovation, and justice,” Zhao said on social media Thursday.
Zhao’s pardon is the last move by a president who has flexed his executive power to bestow clemency on political allies, prominent public figures and others convicted of crimes.
In 2023, Zhao stepped down as the company’s chief executive and Binance admitted to violations of the Bank Secrecy Act and apparent violations of sanctions programs, including its failure to implement reporting programs for suspicious transactions.
“Using new technology to break the law does not make you a disruptor, it makes you a criminal,” said U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland, who called the settlement one of the largest corporate penalties in the nation’s history.
As part of the settlement agreement, the U.S. Treasury said Binance will be subject to five years of monitoring and “significant compliance undertakings, including to ensure Binance’s complete exit from the United States.” Binance is a Cayman Islands limited liability company.
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Zhao, meanwhile, pleaded guilty in a federal court in Seattle on Tuesday to one count of failure to maintain an effective anti-money-laundering program.
Magistrate Judge Brian A. Tsuchida questioned Zhao to make sure he understood the plea agreement, saying at one point: “You knew you didn’t have controls in place.”
“Yes, your honor,” he replied.
Binance wrote in a statement that it made “misguided decisions” as it quickly grew to become the world’s biggest crypto exchange, and said the settlement acknowledges its “responsibility for historical, criminal compliance violations.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt declared in a statement on Thursday that the Biden administration prosecuted Zhao due to a “desire to punish the cryptocurrency industry.”
She mentioned there were “no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims,” even though Zhao pleaded guilty in November to one count of failing to maintain an anti-money-laundering program.
“I failed here,” Zhao confessed to the court last year. “I deeply regret my failure, and I am sorry.”