On Tuesday, Changpeng Zhao, known as CZ, confirmed on Tuesday that he had officially resigned from the position of CEO of crypto exchange Binance.
This was after the US Department of Justice (DOJ) announced charges against the Binance founder and his exchange.
The tweet
Zhao stated that since he had made mistakes, he needed to take responsibility. He also added that it was in his best interest, as well as that of Binance and the community.
He further disclosed that the Global Head of Regional Markets at Binance, Richard Teng, would be taking over the position of CEO.
Teng had joined Binance as the Singapore CEO back in 2021 and had taken over his current position back in May.
Zhao called Richard a highly qualified leader, who had regulatory and financial services experience of over three decades.
The former CEO said that Teng would be able to lead the firm through its next period of growth. He said that under Teng’s guidance, the exchange would deliver in terms of compliance, security, transparency, and growth.
The reason
Zhao had to step down from his position as part of the settlement made with the United States Department of Justice.
For at least three years, CZ cannot be an executive with Binance and an independent monitor will also be appointed.
However, he would continue to be Binance’s majority owner, but the exchange would no longer be able to operate within the United States.
Not long after Zhao’s tweet, Teng also did the same and talked about his future plans. He said that he was taking up the position of Binance’s CEO with deep humility and honor.
He added that it was the largest crypto exchange in the world in terms of trading volume and he took the responsibility of the trust 150 million users very seriously.
He said that he had accepted the role with the support of CZ and the leadership team and he wanted to fulfill and even exceed stakeholders’ expectations, while also achieving their goals.
Other details
Zhao had also said in his tweet that he would be taking a break for now and later pursue other interests around the tech and crypto industries.
He said that he intended to invest passively and become a minority shareholder in startups related to biotech, AI, Web3, DeFi, or blockchain.
He stated that he was pleased to have time to take a closer look at decentralized finance (DeFi). He said that he did not intend to be a CEO of a startup again.
CZ said that he was pleased to have been a one-shot entrepreneur, but he would be interested in mentoring or coaching upcoming entrepreneurs.
He asserted that if nothing else, he could probably teach them what they should not do. His resignation and guilty plea come after various wrongdoing accusations had been dismissed for years.
Back in January, he had said that he would tweet ‘4’ every time these accusations would be made to tell people to ignore the fake attacks, FUD, and so on.