Talk:Binance/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Legal status updates

Hi, KB here from Binance. I have some suggestions to make for the Legal status section, which I noticed is a bit out of date. I'd like to suggest adding the content below to bring the section current as possible using reliable sources. For jurisdictions with more coverage, I've included them as their own subsections, and an "Others" subsection for those with less coverage but mentions in reliable sources:

Extended content

Indonesia

In Indonesia, Binance owns TokoCrypto, a company registered with the local regulator to carry out cryptocurrency activities.

Singapore

In 2019, Binance Asia Services (BAS) began operating a local exchange in Singapore, Binance.sg, under a temporary exemption from the country's regulators while its application was under review. Binance.sg eventually withdrew its application and ceased operations by February 13, 2022. The Binance group of companies remained present in the country, focusing on innovation, incubation, and funding programs there.

Other locations

Binance also has regulatory approval or license to operate in the following locations:

• Lithuania
• Poland
• Spain
• Sweden
• Kazakhstan
• Abu Dhabi
• Bahrain
• Dubai
• New Zealand

References

• One other request, would editors agree to update the Thailand section to note that the exchange there opened in January 2024, per this Reuters article?

Feedback and thoughts are appreciated, I'm happy to discuss these changes with editors. Thanks for taking a look, KB at Binance (talk) 12:53, 25 March 2024 (UTC)

I think the list of countries should probably be in prose, and not a bulleted list. One issue I have is that we normally done do this type of WP:NOTDIR type of content. Binance is essentially a global exchange and operates with or without explicit regulatory approval just about everywhere, so I don't see it is due from a long term perspective to add every country to this article. Is there some other way we can add this to prose to make it encyclopedic? I just dont think a list of regulatory approvals is due here. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 06:04, 31 March 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf: Good point on not letting this become a laundry list of regulatory approvals. Looking at the whole section as it is, do you think it would make sense to reorganize the whole Legal status section into subsections grouped either by continent or major geographic region? I think if we did that, each subsection could have subsubsections on countries that have had major coverage, and otherwise could have a couple of paragraphs summarizing activity in that region. Let me know what you think, I'd be glad to mock something up for you to review. Thanks! KB at Binance (talk) 14:21, 5 April 2024 (UTC)

Our approach here at wikipedia is to build an encyclopedia and we have a strong preference for prose and context. We want to tell a story of the past. To make a hypothetical (and probably untrue) example, say Kenya one day arrested a binance employee at the airport, two years later approved the exchange, and then a year later revoked the exchange's approval would make a great sentence (or two sentences). It tells a story. As opposed to a list of every location that binance is either legal or illegal, which while it might be appropriate for binance's corporate website or blog, it is just not the way we structure things here. I support your proposal to create organizations by region, I think it is logical approach to this type of issue. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 07:04, 6 April 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf: That all makes sense to me. I'll get to work on reorganizing the section, focusing on prose and context. I'll tag you when it's ready for review. Thanks, KB at Binance (talk) 14:35, 10 April 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf: Hi, thanks for your patience. Here's what I've come up with for a reorganization. Have a look and let me know what you think. Throughout the section, I've tried to improve sources and make changes for clarity and neutrality. If it would be helpful, I can make a diff showing them.

• This is more of a question, but I didn't include Kazakhstan, Poland, and Cyprus, because the sources were only passing mentions. Do you think they should be incorporated in some way?

Extended content

Legal status==

Africa and the Middle East===

In June 2023, the Nigerian Securities and Exchange Commission ordered Binance to cease operations in Nigeria. The Commission determined that a Binance subsidiary had not registered with the agency and was illegally soliciting investments in the country.

United Arab Emirates ====

Binance received a provisional license to operate in Abu Dhabi in April 2022. Binance received a license to operate in Bahrain in March 2022, the first license granted by a country in the Gulf Cooperation Council. Binance received a provisional license to operate in Dubai in March 2022 and a full license in July 2023. In April 2024, Binance received an upgraded license allowing it to engage in retail cryptocurrency trading.

Asia and Oceania===

In Indonesia, Binance owns TokoCrypto, a company registered with the local regulator to carry out cryptocurrency activities. Japan's Financial Services Agency warned consumers in 2018 and 2021 that Binance was conducting unauthorized trades in the country. Binance purchased Sakura in November 2022, allowing the company to enter the Japanese market, and in August 2023 launched an exchange in the country. Binance received license to operate in New Zealand in September 2022. The Philippines Securities and Exchange Commission ordered internet service providers to bar users from accessing Binance in March 2024 following the agency finding that the company was operating in the country without a license in 2023. The agency also asked Google and Meta to bar Binance advertisements for Filipino users.

In April 2023, Binance asked the Australian Securities & Investments Commission to cancel the financial services license of subsidiary Oztures Trading Party/Binance Australia Derivatives, which the agency did that month. In May 2023, Cuscal revoked Binance's access to PayID, which prevented clients from making deposits using the service, and Westpac barred its customers from making transactions with the exchange.

Following recommendations from Financial Intelligence Unit—India, the Indian government blocked access to the websites of nine cryptocurrency exchanges in January 2024, including Binance, citing failure to appropriately register, comply with local tax rules, and follow the rules set out in the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

In 2019, Binance Asia Services (BAS) began operating a local exchange in Singapore, Binance.sg, under a temporary exemption from the country's regulators while its application was under review. Binance.sg eventually withdrew its application and ceased operations by 13 February 2022. The Binance group of companies remained present in the country, focusing on innovation, incubation, and funding programs there. The Thai: Office of the Securities and Exchange Commission in Thailand filed a criminal complaint against Binance in 2021 for operating in the country without a license. A joint venture between Binance and Sarath Ratanavadi, Gulf Binance, received regulatory approval to open an exchange in Thailand, which opened in January 2024.

Europe===

Binance registered to operate in Spain in July 2022. Binance received permission to operate in Sweden in January 2023. In June 2023, the Belgian Financial Services and Markets Authority ordered Binance to immediately end its virtual currency operations in Belgium because it was providing the same services to countries outside the European Economic Area. France became the first European country to grant Binance permission to operate in its borders in May 2022. The following year, French authorities opened an investigation into the company for money laundering and offering its services prior to receiving authorization. In April 2021, the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority warned Binance that it risked fines for not releasing a prospectus for the stock tokens it issued.

In July 2021, Italy's Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa warned consumers that Binance was not authorized to operate in the country. It registered with the Organismo degli Agenti e dei Mediatori in May 2022, allowing the company to operate in Italy.

Binance incorporated in Lithuania in 2020, registering as a virtual currency exchange that does not hold or issue funds for clients. It relaunched its Lithuanian affiliate as Bifinity in March 2022. The company also registered Bincance Custody, a digital wallet storage company, in Lithuania in 2021.

The Dutch central bank fined Binance US$3.4 million in July 2022 for operating in the Netherlands without the appropriate registration. Binance ceased operations in the Netherlands in June 2023 after the bank denied the company a license to operate.

In January 2021, the UK's Financial Conduct Authority began requiring firms dealing with cryptoassets to register in order to comply with anti-money laundering rules. In June 2021, Binance was ordered by the FCA to stop all regulated activity in the United Kingdom. In June 2023, the FCA canceled unused permissions granted to Binance Markets Limited, meaning the company “can no longer provide regulated activities and products” in the UK.

North America===

Canada====

In June 2021, Binance announced it would end operations in Ontario following increased provincial regulation. In March 2022, Binance told the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) that it would stop opening new accounts and halt trading on existing accounts in the province. Following new regulations announced by the Canadian Securities Administrators in February 2023 which required cryptocurrency exchanges to register with the agency, Binance left the Canadian market. The company announced its exit in May 2023. That month, OSC opened an investigation into the company's conduct while operating in Ontario.

United States====

In 2019, Binance barred clients in the United States from creating new accounts on Binance.com due to regulatory concerns, and launched Binance.US for American clients. Bloomberg News reported in May 2021 the company was under investigation by officials from the U.S. Department of Justice and Internal Revenue Service involved in investigations related to money laundering and tax violations.

Bloomberg reported in June 2022 that the Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into Binance's initial coin offering in 2017 and Changpeng Zhao involvement with Binance.US. Binance.US announced plans to purchase Voyager Digital's assets in December 2022 and called off the purchase in April 2023, citing a "a hostile and uncertain regulatory environment".

Arkham Intelligence provided data in January 2023 that identified “an alleged nexus of money laundering” from Bitzlato through intermediate wallets of Binance. Over the course of several years, it was found that the intermediary wallet deposited $15 million worth of crypto onto Binance’s platform.

In February 2023, Reuters reported that over the first three months of 2021, Binance transferred over $404 million from a Binance.US account at Silvergate Bank to Merit Peak Ltd., a company managed by Zhao. Catherine Coley, then-CEO of Binance US, was quoted in messages to another Binance executive saying that "no one mentioned" the "unexpected" transfers. Coley left Binance.US shortly thereafter. Reuters said the transfers called into question the purported independence of Binance.US from Binance.com. A Binance.US spokesperson said the Reuters report used "outdated information" without further elaboration.

On 1 March 2023, US Senators Elizabeth Warren, Chris Van Hollen, and Roger Marshall wrote a letter to Binance describing the exchange as "a hotbed of illegal financial activity that has facilitated over $10 billion in payments to criminals and sanctions evaders." The letter formally requested documents related to Binance's compliance with regulations. On 27 March 2023, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a lawsuit against Binance and Zhao in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, claiming willful evasion of US law and allegedly breaching derivatives rules. The agency accused Binance of breaking rules intended to thwart money laundering operations, pointing to internal communications describing transactions by Palestinian militant organization Hamas, and suspected criminals, with the company's money laundering reporting officer allegedly remarking "we see the bad, but we close 2 eyes". In April 2023, three unidentified trading firms cited as "VIP" clients of Binance were revealed to be Radix Trading, Jane Street Capital and Tower Research Capital.

In June 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said it was suing Binance and Zhao on 13 charges for alleged violations of US securities rules.

On September 12, 2023, Binance.US announced the resignation of CEO Brian Shroder and a reduction of the exchange’s workforce by around 100 positions, roughly one-third of its total staff. Binance.US cited the SEC’s civil suit as “an unfortunate example” of the agency’s “aggressive attempts to cripple our industry.”

In October 2023, coinciding with the outbreak of the 2023 Israel–Hamas war, Binance and Tether were described as a source of terrorist funding by US senator Cynthia Lummis and US Representative French Hill, with a letter calling for the Department of Justice to crack down on the exchange.

In November 2023, Binance agreed to plead guilty to violating American anti-money laundering rules and pay a $4.3 billion fine. Zhao agreed to pay a $50 million fine and step down as CEO of the company, but was allowed to maintain his ownership as part of the deal.

As of November 2023, New York, Texas, Vermont, and Hawaii barred Binance.US from conducting business in those states.

Let me know if you have other thoughts on improvements. KB at Binance (talk) 09:09, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

I would suggest this to be merged into prose. Mostly we dont need the sub-sections when it is a sentence. For sure we need a section on the US, as there is so much coverage. I edited some of your suggestions above (hope that is ok with you), feel free to edit again as you see fit. The logic behind my edits was to do away with the small sub-sections, trying to keep a sub-section when it was large enough coverage to make it due for a section. I might have left some sections and merged other sections when you think they should be stand alone, so feel free to let me know. I just wanted to do something to give an example. I used paragraphs to separate counties in some cases when it seemed there was at least two sentences. If just one sentence, it should probably be merged into another paragraph. I also didn't fully merge the Emirates, but that should probably be done. Not a big reason in my opinion to have different sentences for Dubai and Abu Dhabi, I think they are pretty much one and the same. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:44, 30 April 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf: I think we're on the right track here. @Grayfell, Snowmanonahoe, and ARandomName123: Per Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell's conversation in Talk:Binance#Introduction balance, I'm flagging the three of you here since you've all been active on this page recently and might be interested in joining this discussion.

Changes I made to the draft above:

• Added a subheading for UAE and moved it below Nigeria so it didn't look like Nigeria was in the UAE subsection.
• I removed the paragraph on WazirX because it is redundant to what's already in the History section, and I think it fits better there since it's not really about a "legal status". Does that make sense?
• If editors agree with only mentioning WazirX in History, it seems unnecessary to keep a subheading for India so I removed that, too.

That's all. Other than those changes, I think this looks good. Appreciate the help! KB at Binance (talk) 11:59, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

I have modified the formatting of the proposal to facilitate editing on the talk page and to make sure this is eventually archived correctly. This formatting would not belong on the article itself, only this talk page.

I do not accept that removing the information on India is appropriate. It appears to be intentionally whitewashing the article to downplay issues related to money laundering. Since Wikipedia isn't a platform for promotion or public relations, this proposal is not on "the right track". I also notice that the Canada information should be updated. Grayfell (talk) 17:53, 10 May 2024 (UTC)

@KB at Binance: I agree with Grayfell. Currently, all the history section says of WazirX is In November 2019, Binance announced it was acquiring Indian bitcoin exchange WazirX, which became disputed in August 2022 when Binance founder Zhao claimed the deal was never signed. The subheading for India contains much more information that should be kept. I have not reviewed any other proposed edits, so I have no opinion on whether a subheading for UAE is neccessary. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 01:58, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

My suggestion for updating here was to try to reduce the huge number of sub-sections as it is an WP:MOS issue. It was not to remove content from each subsection. If we have a country where there is a extended news, we could do a subsection (for example US is a lot of news). But when the sub-section just says 'it is legal here' or some other nonsense, it should not be a subsection and is starting to be WP:NOTDIR (so we should merge to prose with other news-lite countries). Jtbobwaysf (talk) 05:01, 11 May 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf, ARandomName123, and Grayfell: I appreciate all the responses. And thank you for fixing the formatting, Grayfell.

• Regarding India and the block related to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act: in my draft I split content on that into its own paragraph, which is still there. That is information that makes sense to have in the Legal status section.
• Regarding WazirX: After taking another look, I think ARandomName123 is right that the paragraph about that in Legal status is better. In that case, I'd suggest combining the two paragraphs on WazirX either in History or in Legal status. Would that be a reasonable alternative? I have no issue with there being content about WazirX in the article. My goal is to improve the organization and it seemed to me like having paragraphs about that in two separate sections is confusing and harder to maintain.

Happy to continue this discussion. Thanks, KB at Binance (talk) 16:01, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

@KB at Binance: I'm fine with that alternative. ARandomName123 (talk)^{Ping me!} 16:13, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

I'm sure you are "happy" to continue this discussion, because unlike us, you are paid to have this discussion and drag this out as long as necessary. Your requests are a drain to this volunteer project, stop the condescending business cliches.

I maintain that your proposal whitewashed the content on India, and your proposal doesn't even mention "WazirX" at all. Yes, the article does need to be reorganized, but it is better to have a neutral article which is slightly disorganized than it is to have a promotional article that is superficially tidy. Grayfell (talk) 18:50, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

I too am fine with combining, there is no good reason for the content to be mentioned twice is an article. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 22:11, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

Fine with what, exactly? This is too vague to be actionable. The article needs to be reorganized, but KB at Binance is not qualified to oversee that reorganization. As I mentioned back in November, downplaying these issues by tucking them away is not appropriate and will not gain consensus. Grayfell (talk) 22:48, 15 May 2024 (UTC)

• @Grayfell: see you are adding legal notes status to the history section. So this bears the question, do we even need a legal status section? How about we merge history and legal? 'x legal thing occurred in 2018, then in 2019 y occurred, then 2020 z occurred.' If we keep separate, then how to separate? Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 04:26, 16 May 2024 (UTC)

What I added to the history section would not belong in the legal status section. For one thing, pig butchering scams are an international issue. For another, it is not yet clear if the WSJ's finding will have any legal ramifications, nor is it self-evident what those ramifications would be.

I agree that the legal status status section is messy. This was a gradual process. Back in Jan. 2022, the section only had four subheadings, which was reasonable. I do not accept that the proposed COI replacement actually addresses this issue. Both the article and the proposal are bloated and also missing some important context. Fixing these issues will take more work than that, unfortunately. Grayfell (talk) 05:45, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

We are not going to be adding general content relating to pig butchering scams to the binance article unless they relate to a historical event. Cryptocurrency, bitcoin, gift cards, etc are used for pig butchering, if binance was used, it will have date and event in the source. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:53, 17 May 2024 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf, ARandomName123, and Grayfell: I've done my best here to follow the rules for COI editors, post suggestions, and engage with editors. That will remain my plan going forward. I don't expect editors to agree with all of my proposed changes, but I do believe that's the reason for having a consensus-based system where anyone can voluntarily participate in a good faith discussion. It seems to me we all agree that the article's organization could be improved.

Below, I've included an updated version of the reorganized Legal status section we've been discussing here, which has the WazirX paragraph added back in and combined with the paragraph from History. Ultimately, I'll defer to volunteer editors on what exactly the article should say.

Extended content

Legal status==

Africa and the Middle East===

In June 2023, the Nigerian Securities and Exchange Commission ordered Binance to cease operations in Nigeria. The Commission determined that a Binance subsidiary had not registered with the agency and was illegally soliciting investments in the country.

United Arab Emirates ====

Binance received a provisional license to operate in Abu Dhabi in April 2022. Binance received a license to operate in Bahrain in March 2022, the first license granted by a country in the Gulf Cooperation Council. Binance received a provisional license to operate in Dubai in March 2022 and a full license in July 2023. In April 2024, Binance received an upgraded license allowing it to engage in retail cryptocurrency trading.

Asia and Oceania===

In Indonesia, Binance owns TokoCrypto, a company registered with the local regulator to carry out cryptocurrency activities. Japan's Financial Services Agency warned consumers in 2018 and 2021 that Binance was conducting unauthorized trades in the country. Binance purchased Sakura in November 2022, allowing the company to enter the Japanese market, and in August 2023 launched an exchange in the country. Binance received license to operate in New Zealand in September 2022. The Philippines Securities and Exchange Commission ordered internet service providers to bar users from accessing Binance in March 2024 following the agency finding that the company was operating in the country without a license in 2023. The agency also asked Google and Meta to bar Binance advertisements for Filipino users.

In April 2023, Binance asked the Australian Securities & Investments Commission to cancel the financial services license of subsidiary Oztures Trading Party/Binance Australia Derivatives, which the agency did that month. In May 2023, Cuscal revoked Binance's access to PayID, which prevented clients from making deposits using the service, and Westpac barred its customers from making transactions with the exchange.

In 2019, Binance Asia Services (BAS) began operating a local exchange in Singapore, Binance.sg, under a temporary exemption from the country's regulators while its application was under review. Binance.sg eventually withdrew its application and ceased operations by 13 February 2022. The Binance group of companies remained present in the country, focusing on innovation, incubation, and funding programs there. The Thai: Office of the Securities and Exchange Commission in Thailand filed a criminal complaint against Binance in 2021 for operating in the country without a license. A joint venture between Binance and Sarath Ratanavadi, Gulf Binance, received regulatory approval to open an exchange in Thailand, which opened in January 2024.

India====

In November 2019, Binance announced it was acquiring Indian bitcoin exchange WazirX, which became disputed in August 2022 when Binance founder Zhao claimed the deal was never signed. In August 2022, India's Enforcement Directorate froze the assets of WazirX, an exchange reportedly owned by Binance, as part of a money laundering investigation. The day after the assets were frozen, Changpeng Zhao denied that Binance owned WazirX or equity in Zanmai Labs, the company that operates WazirX. WazirX cofounder Nischal Shetty disputed this claim, saying that WazirX had been acquired by Binance. TechCrunch reported the acquisition had been announced by Binance in a company blog post in 2019.

Following recommendations from Financial Intelligence Unit—India, the Indian government blocked access to the websites of nine cryptocurrency exchanges in January 2024, including Binance, citing failure to appropriately register, comply with local tax rules, and follow the rules set out in the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

Europe===

Binance registered to operate in Spain in July 2022. Binance received permission to operate in Sweden in January 2023. In June 2023, the Belgian Financial Services and Markets Authority ordered Binance to immediately end its virtual currency operations in Belgium because it was providing the same services to countries outside the European Economic Area. France became the first European country to grant Binance permission to operate in its borders in May 2022. The following year, French authorities opened an investigation into the company for money laundering and offering its services prior to receiving authorization. In April 2021, the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority warned Binance that it risked fines for not releasing a prospectus for the stock tokens it issued.

In July 2021, Italy's Commissione Nazionale per le Società e la Borsa warned consumers that Binance was not authorized to operate in the country. It registered with the Organismo degli Agenti e dei Mediatori in May 2022, allowing the company to operate in Italy.

Binance incorporated in Lithuania in 2020, registering as a virtual currency exchange that does not hold or issue funds for clients. It relaunched its Lithuanian affiliate as Bifinity in March 2022. The company also registered Bincance Custody, a digital wallet storage company, in Lithuania in 2021.

The Dutch central bank fined Binance US$3.4 million in July 2022 for operating in the Netherlands without the appropriate registration. Binance ceased operations in the Netherlands in June 2023 after the bank denied the company a license to operate.

In January 2021, the UK's Financial Conduct Authority began requiring firms dealing with cryptoassets to register in order to comply with anti-money laundering rules. In June 2021, Binance was ordered by the FCA to stop all regulated activity in the United Kingdom. In June 2023, the FCA canceled unused permissions granted to Binance Markets Limited, meaning the company “can no longer provide regulated activities and products” in the UK.

North America===

Canada====

In June 2021, Binance announced it would end operations in Ontario following increased provincial regulation. In March 2022, Binance told the Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) that it would stop opening new accounts and halt trading on existing accounts in the province. Following new regulations announced by the Canadian Securities Administrators in February 2023 which required cryptocurrency exchanges to register with the agency, Binance left the Canadian market. The company announced its exit in May 2023. That month, OSC opened an investigation into the company's conduct while operating in Ontario.

United States====

In 2019, Binance barred clients in the United States from creating new accounts on Binance.com due to regulatory concerns, and launched Binance.US for American clients. Bloomberg News reported in May 2021 the company was under investigation by officials from the U.S. Department of Justice and Internal Revenue Service involved in investigations related to money laundering and tax violations.

Bloomberg reported in June 2022 that the Securities and Exchange Commission opened an investigation into Binance's initial coin offering in 2017 and Changpeng Zhao involvement with Binance.US. Binance.US announced plans to purchase Voyager Digital's assets in December 2022 and called off the purchase in April 2023, citing a "a hostile and uncertain regulatory environment".

Arkham Intelligence provided data in January 2023 that identified “an alleged nexus of money laundering” from Bitzlato through intermediate wallets of Binance. Over the course of several years, it was found that the intermediary wallet deposited $15 million worth of crypto onto Binance’s platform.

In February 2023, Reuters reported that over the first three months of 2021, Binance transferred over $404 million from a Binance.US account at Silvergate Bank to Merit Peak Ltd., a company managed by Zhao. Catherine Coley, then-CEO of Binance US, was quoted in messages to another Binance executive saying that "no one mentioned" the "unexpected" transfers. Coley left Binance.US shortly thereafter. Reuters said the transfers called into question the purported independence of Binance.US from Binance.com. A Binance.US spokesperson said the Reuters report used "outdated information" without further elaboration.

On 1 March 2023, US Senators Elizabeth Warren, Chris Van Hollen, and Roger Marshall wrote a letter to Binance describing the exchange as "a hotbed of illegal financial activity that has facilitated over $10 billion in payments to criminals and sanctions evaders." The letter formally requested documents related to Binance's compliance with regulations. On 27 March 2023, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed a lawsuit against Binance and Zhao in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, claiming willful evasion of US law and allegedly breaching derivatives rules. The agency accused Binance of breaking rules intended to thwart money laundering operations, pointing to internal communications describing transactions by Palestinian militant organization Hamas, and suspected criminals, with the company's money laundering reporting officer allegedly remarking "we see the bad, but we close 2 eyes". In April 2023, three unidentified trading firms cited as "VIP" clients of Binance were revealed to be Radix Trading, Jane Street Capital and Tower Research Capital.

In June 2023, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said it was suing Binance and Zhao on 13 charges for alleged violations of US securities rules.

On September 12, 2023, Binance.US announced the resignation of CEO Brian Shroder and a reduction of the exchange’s workforce by around 100 positions, roughly one-third of its total staff. Binance.US cited the SEC’s civil suit as “an unfortunate example” of the agency’s “aggressive attempts to cripple our industry.”

In October 2023, coinciding with the outbreak of the 2023 Israel–Hamas war, Binance and Tether were described as a source of terrorist funding by US senator Cynthia Lummis and US Representative French Hill, with a letter calling for the Department of Justice to crack down on the exchange.

In November 2023, Binance agreed to plead guilty to violating American anti-money laundering rules and pay a $4.3 billion fine. Zhao agreed to pay a $50 million fine and step down as CEO of the company, but was allowed to maintain his ownership as part of the deal.

As of November 2023, New York, Texas, Vermont, and Hawaii barred Binance.US from conducting business in those states.

References

I'll be away for the next couple of months. If any of the proposed content above can be helpful, feel free to implement and/or make any needed changes. Jtbobwaysf, I especially would like to thank you for the time you've spent discussing changes with me. I have learned a lot about how Wikipedia works over the past few months. Thanks, KB at Binance (talk) 10:22, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

This will take time to review, and the massive size of this change makes it more difficult than it should be. Please wait a bit before making any of these changes, but the default position for promotional editing should always be 'no'. Grayfell (talk) 19:13, 21 May 2024 (UTC)

I've had some time to review it more closely.

The first thing I notice is that the proposal falsely lists Bahrain as part of the UAE.

The arrangement of the 'Africa and the Middle East' section functionally donwplays Binance's illegality in Nigeria and instead emphasise it's more positive reception in the Middle East. This organizational trick aligns with Binance's PR describing the Middle East as more friendly than other countries. This is per cited sources, so ingoring this context is not neutral and not appropriate. As I've already explained, 'rearranging' the article is no an excuse for PR or whitewashing.

The very next source after that subsection is "Binance Ousts Tokocrypto CEO and Is Cutting 58% of Jobs at Unit". To summarize such a source only for positive statements is cherry-picking.

I could go on, but honestly, I don't think that's a productive use of my time. Put simply, this proposal is not neutral and not appropriate and Wikipedia is not a platform for promotion or advocacy. Expecting volunteers to clean up sloppy PR like this is an insult. Grayfell (talk) 04:14, 22 May 2024 (UTC)

Add source + consolidate redundant content

Hello, I'm KB and I work for Binance. It's been a while since I've posted a request here, and I wanted to clearly reiterate my conflict of interest and that I will not directly make changes to the article.

This is a two part request.

Part 1: I saw a recent addition was made to the France subsection in Legal status without a source. Here is a Reuters article that confirms that information.

Part 2: I also noticed that the same edit includes the following content about litigation in the United States, "This follows earlier probes in 2023, including Binance’s $4.3 billion fine by U.S. authorities and the resignation of CEO Changpeng Zhao after he served prison time." The article body now repeats information about this litigation in three sections of the article.

In United States there are two nearly identical paragraphs:

• "In November 2023, Binance agreed to plea guilty and pay a $4.3 billion fine. Zhao agreed to pay a $50 million fine and step down as CEO of the company, but was allowed to maintain his ownership as part of the deal.[154][155]"
• "On November 21, 2023, Binance pleaded guilty to federal charges in the U.S., admitting that it engaged in money laundering, unlicensed money transmitting, and sanctions violations; and has agreed to pay over $4 billion in fines.[156]"

And the History section says:

• "On November 21, 2023, a US judge convicted Binance on multiple charges—including violations of the Bank Secrecy Act, money laundering schemes, unlicensed money transmitting, and sanctions violations. As part of the plea deal, the company agreed to pay $4 billion in fines, and Changpeng Zhao stepped down as CEO with a $50 million fine.[75]"

This seems to be WP:UNDUE to reiterate the same information so many times. I propose consolidating this information into one section of the article body, either History or United States. I think History makes more sense, but I'll defer to consensus.

Thanks for taking a look at my request, let me know if you have any questions. KB at Binance (talk) 12:30, 12 February 2025 (UTC)

Added the source, thanks for that! Re: the repetition, two paragraphs in United States definitely need to be consolidated, they make it look like there two different pleas in Nov 2023. On the other hand, while I don't love repeating the plea in two different sections, it is very relevant in both of them (and re: due weight, was kind of a big deal), so I don't really like the idea of removing them either. Going to leave this here and see if any other editors would like to weigh in. Rusalkii (talk) 08:14, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

I've consolidated the two United States paragraphs into one non-repetitive one. Rusalkii (talk) 08:16, 14 February 2025 (UTC)

@Rusalkii: Hello, and thank you for taking the time to review my request and make those changes. I understand what you mean about the information being relevant to both sections, especially given the length of the article. That said, do you think it also needs to be repeated in the France section? Thanks again, KB at Binance (talk) 10:05, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

No it shouldnt be repeated in France section either. I have removed it. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 23:25, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf: Hey! Thanks for making that change. KB at Binance (talk) 08:47, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Several updates

Hello, KB from Binance here with some more updates to suggest. As always, I will not make changes myself because of my conflict of interest:

• In Legal Status - Nigeria, add "In October 2024, Gambaryan was released after the Nigerian government dropped charges against him.

• Reason: Updates the status of this case, which involves a living person. I read through WP:BLP and believe the maintenance section is applicable here.

Source: Supported by Reuters, and BBC.

• In Legal Status - United States add "Judge Amy Berman Jackson placed a temporary hold on the SEC's lawsuit against Binance on February 13, 2025, following a joint request filed by both parties."

• Reason: Updates the status of this case.
• Source: Supported by Reuters

• In the History section, add "Binance processed $18.1 trillion in trades in 2023."

• Reason: Gives context on the size of the company.
• Source: Supported by CNBC

References

Thank you for taking a look at my request, let me know if you have any questions. KB at Binance (talk) 08:47, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Lets see if others disagree, but for me it would be easier if you made the proposed changes, then self revert, and post the diff here. I suggest to do in bit sized changes. This allows us editors to be lazy and implement them. Let's see if anyone else disagrees. I often do these self reverts so I can produce a diff when I want to propose an RFC or something like that. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 09:10, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Don't bother. It really isn't that hard to evaluate these changes. I've implemented the first one, as this seems useful. The US one needs a bit more context. The large number factoid is inane cherry-picking. You can continue to discuss these changes, if you wish, but please do not re-open this template until consensus has formed. Grayfell (talk) 11:26, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

I agree with Grayfell, the points 2 and 3 are more like recent news. We dont really care about a pause in the lawsuit, too much detail for us. Third everyone knows Binance is big, we dont need monthly numbers here. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 11:31, 7 March 2025 (UTC)

Thank you to both editors for reviewing this and implementing the appropriate items. I see what you both mean about the latter two requests. KB at Binance (talk) 15:52, 12 March 2025 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 4 April 2025

Spelling error - Change "npt" to "not" in the last paragraph of the "2020–2023: acquisitions and investments" section. HugoTro (talk) 19:04, 4 April 2025 (UTC)

 Done Good catch, thanks. LizardJr8 (talk) 19:20, 4 April 2025 (UTC)

Proposed updates

Hello, KB from Binance here and I have a request for editors. Like before, I will not make changes myself because of my conflict of interest.

• Add to the India subsection of the Legal status section: "Binance registered with India's Financial Intelligence Unit India regulation in 2024 so that it could resume operations in India."
  • Reason: Give update to show that Binance can operate in India.

• Add to the Legal status section: "At the start of 2024, Binance received a Virtual Asset Service Provider permit in Dubai.
  • Reason: Give update to show where Binance can operate, as of most recent reporting.

• Add to the History section: "Binance had 237 million users, as of 2024."
  • Reason: Give the most recent size of Binance's user base.

References

I would be curious to hear editors' thoughts on the overall structure of this page and whether or not adjustments are needed. I notice there's a lot of WP:PROSELINE in History especially.

Thank you for taking a look at my request, let me know if you have any questions. KB at Binance (talk) 07:31, 19 March 2025 (UTC)

I did go ahead and add your proposed changes. Note I added the size instead to the lead as i think it is useful there. The number is so large, it is thus important and DUE in the lead in my opinion. It gives the reader an idea of size and scope. I would not be keen to update this number continually, monthly, etc. As for the other country data, I am concerned about the growing WP:NOTDIR appearance to the list and would prefer that it be moved into prose. I thus put the Dubai content in a general section, to see if other editors first agree to get out of the list format. I dont want to see this list of countries continue to grow (other than the countries that are very notable in terms of coverage). I would rather see the list of sub-countries prunded down to a handful of notable cases, say 5 (just picking a random number) with the rest of the content merged into prose. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 12:11, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

These were trivial details, and these sources did not demonstrate any lasting significance or provide any context. Wikipedia isn't a platform for PR, and this kind of pro-corporate advocacy is not prodcutive. Grayfell (talk) 09:28, 21 March 2025 (UTC)

I felt the size of the exchange's user base is particularly due in the lead as it shows reader the scope of the organization. Hundreds of millions of users is a large scope, and our summary doesn't do it justice. Yes, the source is a bit weak, but when i looked at it, it was a real newspaper with an expat employed writer focusing on a particular region. Maybe the COI editor can look for a better source, maybe Bloomberg or NYT, or something like that. I fundamentally disagree this is puffery in nature. While you might be able to argue that the COI editor is editing from a WP:Puffery goal, we are required to WP:AGF and given the subjects #1 position in a large market, the user numbers is not puffery in my opinion. Others might disagree. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 09:50, 21 March 2025 (UTC)

Yes, others disagree. That's why I reverted it. Our goal is to provide context to readers. If you need a specific detail to 'show the scope' than find a better source and summarize more neutrally.

As for the other changes, nowhere does the article even hint at what a "Virtual Asset Service Provider" is in Dubai or anywhere else, nor does it indicate why a permit for such a thing is important... but it sure sounds impressive, doesn't it? That is presumably why it was proposed -not to inform, but to promote.

The info on India was more confusing than informative, since it cited a source from May after a source from June -Binance applied for a permit the month before they were fined by the Indian government, but the article implied it was after. This would need a lot more context to make sense at all, and if this belongs, it needs to be integrated into the rest of the paragraph, not just misleadingly and redundantly dropped at the end.

I also noticed that the article vaguely and positively mentioned "a stablecoin project" with a WP:CLOSEPARAPHRASE of a contemporary source. That source did mention the name of that stablecoin, because why wouldn't it? It was Terra. The article needs more work, in other words. It does not need more PR. Grayfell (talk) 10:23, 21 March 2025 (UTC)

Your justification for the removal of the India content is what exactly? The previous content states they were fined and the new content states they were approved to operate. What is wrong with that exactly? Are you seeking to only include negative content? Why would we make the article intentionally out of date when we have an RS for it? Jtbobwaysf (talk) 12:52, 21 March 2025 (UTC)

Adding that at the end falsely implied that the company applied after they were fined, but it was the other way around. To avoid promotional factoids, this needs to be summarized appropriately. Doing so in chronological order would make this a lot more sensible, but as always, it would be better to use those later sources to provide context. In other words, it would be better to use sources to indicate why this even matters. Grayfell (talk) 19:25, 21 March 2025 (UTC)

I thought it was an update on the legal status in India. Maybe I was confused. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 08:17, 22 March 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: We have a few topics running here, so I'll try to keep my thoughts organized in bullets:

• Regarding user numbers: This seems like common information that is included in articles about entities that have a user / member base and is often kept in the Infobox. Right now, the article cites 120 million users in 2023 to Forbes in the History section. I do not think the number would need to be updated more than annually, but it seems like information that is common to include along with other operational details such as staff, revenue, etc.
• Regarding Legal status - India: Adding the Reuters sources add more credibility, and can add additional context to the penalty that's already mentioned. The two can be summarized together as follows:

• Binance registered with India's Financial Intelligence Unit India regulation (FIU) in May 2024. A FIU official said the company would be able to resume operations after paying penalties for previous non-compliance. In June, the FIU imposed Binance with a fine of US$ 2.25 million, for operating in India in violation of local anti-money laundering regulations.

References

• Regarding Dubai: The Bloomberg source does have more context. Here's a larger summary:

• "At the start of 2024, Binance received a Virtual Asset Service Provider permit from Dubai's Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority, allowing the company to engage in retail cryptocurrency trading, having previously held a limited interim permit. The permit was granted on condition that former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao give up voting control of the company's Dubai entity."

References

• Jtbobwaysf, I agree with your suggestion that the Legal status section is getting unwieldy and will need to be curtailed. I spent some time looking at how similar sections in other articles have been addressed, and one thing I found was a WP:CONTENTSPLIT, and I see that in some cases there's a litigation article separate from the main company article. If the content should stay on Wikipedia longterm, but is starting to clog this article, I wonder if that's a potential avenue?

• I am committed to following the rules for COI editors by making transparent edit requests using the best available sources (excluding cryptocurrency news outlets), seeking consensus with volunteer editors, and assuming good faith. I see the Wikipedia article as an important resource for anyone interested in learning about Binance, and my goal is to help maintain a balanced and well written article. To the point made earlier about not cherry-picking details, I believe this applies to both positive and negative content. Over the past year, I've noticed a tendency for news about litigation to be added, sometimes without context. The redundant and out-of-place mentions of the plea deal in the US were a good example of this. It's more informative to readers if they can see a summary of the whole story, which includes litigation and other updates such as large increases in usership that show growth.

Looking back at past requests, it appears we are repeating a similar pattern and I think it would be good if we had more editors involved in our discussion since it seems like we won't find consensus among the three of us. Rusalkii, you recently responded on this page, are you interested in weighing in on any of this? I can also invite editors from relevant Wikiprojects to join the discussion. Thanks, KB at Binance (talk) 15:24, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

You are attempting to WP:CANVASS other editors who you think might be more sympathetic to your promotional goals. To put it another way, it appears that you don't like the answers you're getting from me, so you want to find different editors who will help you promote your company. Wikipedia is not a platform for public relations, and tactical behavior like this will only undermine your credibility even further.

My point about Dubai was not that context did not exist, it was that the change to the article did not provide any of that context, nor did it indicate why this was even important enough to mention at all. As presented it was a vague factoid.

Regarding the context itself, if your employer already had an 'interim permit' in one particular jurisdiction (meaning the company had already been offering retail trading), why would this change be important to readers? This appears to be using routine activity to bloat the section, and the only reason for that is to displace more significant and less flattering information.

The current article is a mess, but it does, at least, explain why Binance's public reputation is what it is. It is not some great mystery why reliable sources will document the company's many legal issues. Our goal is not to inflate the article with false balance, it's to summarize reliable, independent sources in proportion to due weight.

Grayfell (talk) 20:28, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

First to ping two different editors, you and me who are both participating in this discussion, is not at all remotely WP:CANVASS. It is clear that I am somewhat supportive of the editors changes and you are not supportive. Binance has a good reputation actually and this article does a poor job of that, and the false balance is in fact all the negative content. It is worded more as a hit piece. Sadly this is the case with many articles as the press tend to cover more negative stuff than positive. Wikipedia is not a place for advocacy against cryptocurrency, see WP:SOAP. Next as for what the editor is suggesting, I am still a bit confused. I dont think that the legal status of the article is WP:UNDUE but I dont like the list format. I would prefer it to be put into prose. Part of Binance's history is its many legal dealings, which one editor thinks paints a negative light (eg public reputation), it in fact does not it shows that exchange has done a lot of work globally on compliance. KB, please just flesh the issues out on this talk page and we can use an WP:RFC on anything that we think is not covered properly. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 23:16, 27 March 2025 (UTC)

They also pinged Rusalkii, who has previously been sympathetic to this editor's requests. When a paid editor receives push-back, their first response cannot be to immediately start looking for someone else who will agree with them. This just leads to edit warring and similar. It's also not professional behavior, it's something children do when they want a cookie before dinner. I am not Binance's stern mom, and you shouldn't pretend to be Binance's permissive dad. Inviting even more editors into this at this early stage is only going to be disruptive, and is a great example of why so few editors like to handle COI requests at all.

Your personal opinion that Binance has a good reputation is not well-supported by those reliable sources which are already cited in this article. Outside of the unreliable pro-crypto bubble, every cryptocurrency platform is mainly discussed in reference to problems: gambling, money laundering, pig butchering, sanctions evading, rug pulls, darknet markets, etc... While this is not specific to Binance, Binance is not exempt from this coverage since it is the largest provider of these services. For example, just this week in the New York Times: "When victims sent money to the accounts, the funds quickly moved to a bank in the Bahamas. From there, the money was used to purchase Tether cryptocurrency held on the exchange Binance." You can make whatever comparisons you want to how banks and fiat currency are covered, but that doesn't change anything here. I would guess that these kinds of issues represent the overwhelming majority of coverage of Binance in reliable sources. Any attempt to artificially shift the article away from how most reliable sources cover the topic is non-neutral. This is why Binance and so many other crypto projects need to rely on pro-crypto pseudo-journalism to assist them with their PR. It's also likely the reason they pay people to try and edit Wikipedia. Grayfell (talk) 23:49, 28 March 2025 (UTC)

Binance is the largest global exchange, its no surprise that it is used to purchase a stable coin. I think you are right the majority of coverage is negative. However, the COI editors edits, which we can be assumed to put the company is a positive light, are acceptable from my POV regardless. User quantities and expansion of a sub-section are quite non-controversial edits which you reverted. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 02:33, 29 March 2025 (UTC)

The source isn't talking about 'purchasing a stable coin' in isolation, it's talking about laundering money which was stolen from victims of fraud. You do understand this, right? So from sources like this, how did Binance become so large? Per many reliable sources, this isn't exactly a coincidence.

Since I have controverted them, the changes are not 'non-controversial'. Find better sources, and look at what those sources are actually saying in total, not just the bits which are useful from your POV. Grayfell (talk) 23:00, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

I recognize that you want to introduce negative light edits on to this article. That is your own pejorative. However, you are using that to state that WP:DUE inclusions are not valid as it might somehow show that Binance is large and/or has some sort of license in India. Your conclusion is incorrect and is bordering on POV pushing. There is no reason not to include all types of properly sourced content to this article. Are we going to have to start putting these simple changes to RFC? Seems silly, but maybe necessary if you continue with this. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:47, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

I assume by 'pejorative' you mean 'prerogative'. My goal is not to "introduce negative light edits on to this article". My goal is to summarize reliable sources according to due weight. The way to resolve these issues is with neutral proposals which provide enough context for readers to properly assess these details for themselves. For many of these details, that is impossible, because they are undue and trivial.

Not every detail which can be sourced belongs in an article. This is what editing means -deciding what to include and what to leave-out.

Reliable sources are, by definition, sources which are willing to critically examine a topic. Sources which merely pass-along minor details or press releases are fundamentally less reliable.

So, when a reliable secondary source covers some detail, it also includes at least some context. Editing means we have to evaluate if we should summarize a detail, and how to do that proportionately. Binance having applied for "some sort of license in India" is not inherently noteworthy. It needs context, and that context needs to come from a reliable source. Grayfell (talk) 21:42, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

Yes, I meant to say prerogative. Thank you. We have a subsection on India in this article. There is no reason not to expand it. The other route would be to kill the sub-section entirely and merge it all into prose. Arguing that a tiny couple sentence sub section is enough and cannot handle any expansion is silly. Properly sourced and neutral content is due for inclusion even if it is suggested by a COI editor. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:54, 31 March 2025 (UTC)

You're missing the point and putting words into my mouth. At no point did I say that it "cannot handle any expansion". As I've said several times, these details need to provide context to readers, otherwise there is no point in including them. Without context, this is just an isolated factoid. Grayfell (talk) 03:49, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

So you are saying the India content is ok it just needed to be re-worded to add context? What context was the user numbers missing? Jtbobwaysf (talk) 05:57, 1 April 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: I'm curious to hear Grayfell's thoughts on what context would be helpful here. If we're still having trouble finding consensus among the three of us, I suggest we ask editors from WikiProject Cryptocurrency to join the discussion. Thanks, 10:18, 7 April 2025 (UTC) (— Preceding unsigned comment added by KB at Binance (talk • contribs) 10:19, 7 April 2025 (UTC))

Briefly reviewing the discussions here: It would be of great help of KB at Binance would follow WP:COI more closely. --Hipal (talk) 22:07, 7 April 2025 (UTC)

Source tag clean up

Hello, KB here with another request. The article has a few tags about needing better, or non-primary sources, so I've looked around and have suggestions for addressing those tags:

• In 2018–2019: launch of stablecoin and security breach there's a "better source needed" tag for "Withdrawals resumed by 19 May." with the reason in the tag being "Citation is the Binance company website, which is not objective". The claim is verifying a date, which seems non-controversial enough, but also like it's not a crucial date to include in the history of the company longterm. I did not locate a source in mainstream press to verify the same claim, so I propose the following change:

−

Binance halted further withdrawals and deposits but allowed trading to continue. The site pledged to reimburse customers. Withdrawals resumed by 19 May.<sup class="noprint Inline-Template noprint noexcerpt Template-Fact" style="white-space:nowrap;">[<i>[[Wikipedia:Verifiability#Questionable sources|<span title="Citation is the Binance company website, which is not objective. (August 2022)">better source needed</span>]]</i>]</sup>

+

Binance temporarily halted further withdrawals and deposits but allowed trading to continue. The site pledged to reimburse customers.

• In 2020–2023: acquisitions and investments, "On 13 June 2022, Binance announced that for an unspecified period of time users would not be unable to withdraw their funds held in bitcoin, as the value of cryptocurrencies suffered serious declines. Two hours after that announcement, bitcoin withdrawals were allowed to resume." with the same reason that the company's website is not objective.

• I was able to locate this CBS News article confirms that withdrawals resumed the same day.

• In BNB there's a "citation needed" tag for "BNB (Build'N'Build) is a token on the BNB chain. It was originally called Binance Coin when it was launched in July 2017,"

• This Bloomberg article confirms the ICO was in 2017, and that the token's original name was Binance Coin.

• In First Digital USD there's a "non-primary source needed" tag for the entire section.

• I didn't see much mainstream press that covered this, but did find this source from The Business Times that confirms Binance discontinued support for BUSD. I could not locate a source that verifies "The company advised users in possession of Binance USD assets to migrate to First Digital USD (FDUSD), with the conclusion of this transition set for February 2024.". I suggest cutting that sentence, and moving the remaining content from this section to the end of Binance USD (BUSD).

Because of my COI, I do not make direct edits to the article. Thanks for taking the time to review my suggestions. KB at Binance (talk) 21:45, 30 April 2025 (UTC)

• I have implemented the second and third of these four proposals, and have partially implemented the fourth. The first one still needs a source. The source for the fourth doesn't appear sufficient for this, but I agree that the line about 'First Digital' should be axed, which makes the subsection unnecessary. Grayfell (talk) 23:30, 30 April 2025 (UTC)

@Grayfell: Thanks for implementing those changes. I took another look around for the first and fourth, here's what I found:

• In 2018–2019: launch of stablecoin and security breach: The Asia Times article currently cited in the article says "The exchange continued to state that all transactions have been suspended while the investigation continues and that stolen funds will be reimbursed in full. The security review is expected to take a week during which time users will still be able to trade but cannot deposit or withdraw funds from the exchange." Is that adequate to support the change I suggested?
• First Digital USD: I looked around again and only found mainstream press that covered the order to stop minting BUSD in Feb. 2023, everything about discontinuing support was primary, in crypto press or a WP:FORBESCON. At any rate, I think this is better now. The discontinuation seems like a reasonable detail to include, but since there's not a third-party source I'll defer to your judgment on whether it belongs in the article at all.

Thanks again! KB at Binance (talk) 14:00, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

The Asia Times article is talking about things that were 'expected' to happen in the future according to Binance itself. This is only slightly better than the blog source. A later source which confirms what actually happened would be much better. Grayfell (talk) 18:10, 7 May 2025 (UTC)

KB, to echo Grayfells' point, please remember that WP:CRYSTAL applies to our sourcing policies. So if something was predicted to happen at future date in an old source (and the prediction came true) we normally would not be able to use the older source to document the event. We need a source after the event that makes it encyclopedic. We are editing and encyclopedia and for the most part we are documenting things that actually happened. Yes, we do in some cases document things that didnt happen, but for our purposes here on this Binance article we are probably going to need sources after the event, rather than before the event. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 04:42, 8 May 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: I see what you both mean with that rule. Luckily, I have found an article from TechCrunch that says, "...that hack, which saw Binance pause withdrawals and deposits for a week...", referring to the May 7, 2019 security breach. I think "for a week" confirms the pause was temporary, in line with my earlier suggestion. Also, there are some other sources, too, but this one looks like the best to me.

Here is the suggestion again with the new source:

Binance temporarily halted further withdrawals and deposits but allowed trading to continue. The site pledged to reimburse customers.

This should be enough to update the article and remove that "better source needed" tag. Let me know if you have any other thoughts. Thanks! KB at Binance (talk) 07:49, 12 May 2025 (UTC)

Seems fine to me, or we could even summarize literally to say "deposits were paused for a week" Let's see what Grayfell says. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 00:09, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

I've made an edit to include a TechCrunch source. Perhaps I missed it, but I do not see where any of these sources support the line that Binance "...allowed trading to continue." so I have removed that part. Per cited sources, all transactions were temporarily halted. Grayfell (talk) 03:19, 13 May 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: This makes sense to me! Thank you KB at Binance (talk) 07:36, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

References

Article redraft

Hi @Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: I wanted to thank you for your time spent making this article improved and more encyclopedic. I think much work remains to be done on this front. I know previously I made suggestions that other editors found too promotional. Because of this, I would like to suggest we all work together to improve this article past C-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale.

I can make a User space copy of this article and include some of my suggestions in it. You both, along with all other interested editors, can then directly edit in that space. This way, you can just remove any suggestions I made that you find promotional or ill sourced and add things that you think would improve the article.

I understand editors' concerns about promotional content, and appreciate the interest volunteer editors are taking in this. I really value Wikipedia as a resource and know there are lots of articles to keep up on, so I hope to find ways I can lighten the load and constructively support the article being accurate and encyclopedic. I hope to work with you both to make this happen. Are you interested in collaborating? KB at Binance (talk) 16:07, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

Some articles will never have their assessment class raised. It really depends on the quantity of material out there with good sources. Given the controversial nature of the subject and the mainstream media's slant towards negativity in relating to cryptocurrency in general and even more so focused on centralized exchanges, I doubt we will have the NPOV necessary to get good balance on the article. That said, we will continue to help you to improve it. I suggest you continue to propose changes. Proposing a change in your sandbox can be a good approach. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:49, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

I strongly recommend against creating a user-space copy of the entire article. This would make evaluating individual changes much, much harder, and therefor much less likely to gain consensus. Incremental proposals are a much better approach here.

Regarding the "mainstream media's" negative slant, I see two issues: The first is that Wikipedia fundamentally has a mainstream bias as an encyclopedia. We need reliable sources, and like it or not, mainstream sources meet Wikipedia's needs better than most niche, fringe, or "alternative" outlets. The cryptocurrency industry's standards for both news and academic publishing are absolute garbage. I'm not inclined to sugar coat that. Financial journalism and business academia already had pretty bad problems with credulity before crypto entered the scene, but it's gotten even worse since then. This makes it much harder to find reliable source for this set of topics.

The second issue is that a glut of promotional editing has made Wikipedia a lot less patient with cryptocurrency specifically. You cannot do anything about the first issue, but you can do something about the second. Please do what you can to avoid taking up more time from volunteer editors than necessary, as this will only make the second issue even worse. Grayfell (talk) 22:36, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: Thanks for the response! I see what you both mean. In the interest of not taking up unneeded time from volunteer editors, would it work better for the two of you if I identified issues before proposing content? That way, neither of you would have to review a request for something you do not believe is even an issue. Just trying to think of ways to make this process more efficient. If we did this, I could ping you both before adding to the queue, and then if we agree to move forward, I will make a formal request in the COI edit queue. What do you think? KB at Binance (talk) 13:09, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

Sure, its ok with me to just identify proposed changes rather than user-space since Grayfell is opposed to that. Wikipedia for sure has a bias which causes us to tend towards whatever the NYT and Bloomberg think. Far larger issue that I know how to deal with, and the problem is even worse on other medical pages, etc. For example the covid history. I dont think there is a resolution to that, nor would I even know how to start. I dont think this bias will be corrected on this page either, we just have to wait for the mainstream press to think Binance is ok before it will be reflected as 'ok' at wikipedia. It is not a solution to use low quality sources as Grayfell points out. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 11:11, 5 June 2025 (UTC)

"WazirX" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect WazirX has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 July 12 § WazirX until a consensus is reached. Koshuri ^(あ!) 07:22, 12 July 2025 (UTC)

Article improvements

@Jtbobwaysf and Grayfell: based on our previous discussion, I have taken a brief pause to re-read this article, the general Manual of Style plus MOS guideline for companies, and then crypto company articles to get the general idea of how these should look.

Based on this, I have come up with a few things this article could improve on. As to not waste yours and other editors' time, I ask if we agree that these are all things we should focus in on:

• My understanding is that the introduction is supposed to be a general overview of the most important points in a nutshell. Meanwhile, this one gets into a lot of granular detail.
  • Idea: refine the intro

• The History section subheadings aren't logical. The third is 2020–2023: acquisitions and investments but acquisitions and investments happen outside of this time period too.
  • Idea: restructure subheadings into clearer time periods. For example: Early history (2017-2023), where the CEO change is a natural break in the company's history.

• The History section is also acting as a sort of catch-all section and introducing information based on the date it happened. An example of this is, "In July 2018, Binance acquired Trust Wallet, a decentralized cryptocurrency wallet for an undisclosed sum composed of a mixture of cash, Binance stock, and BNB tokens." (This is also one of those examples of an acquisition outside of the 2020–2023: acquisitions and investments subsection). As a result, this History section is also very long.
  • Idea: Find the information not best suited for a History section and move it elsewhere. From what I have seen, commonly used examples of other sections include "Company overview", "Partnerships and acquisitions", "Global operations", and "Products/Services". Maybe all four of these are not needed, but some of these could be used.

• The Tokens section seems to be serving almost as a proxy for a "Products" or "Services" section when really it should be a subsection within a "Products" or "Services". There is a sort of funny oversight where the article doesn't actually really establish what Binance even is. The article is almost so distracted by outlining History that it forgets to even define the basics of the company. The intro says "cryptocurrency exchange" and the Infobox says Binance serves users worldwide. But beyond that, there are no explanations for generally what Binance does, what its platform is, and the overall services it offers.
  • Idea: A Products or Services section that includes clear information on Binance does with a subsection on Tokens

• The Legal status section is long, split up into 14 different subsections. Surely there is a better way to organize this information?
  • Idea: One possible solution is that this may need to be its own article. There is just so much here. It isn't quite long enough to move under WP:SIZERULE, but I was thinking more due to WP:SPINOFF.

That goes through each section. If we can agree on tackling this with the same goals, then our experience will be more collaborative and I won't waste anyone's time suggesting content for things that you disagree with on the basis that it doesn't even need improvement. Let me know your general thoughts on this and if you have any other ideas! My suggestions are merely spitballing but I recognize that you may have suggestions based on rules or guidelines I don't even know about. Thanks for reading this though! KB at Binance (talk) 08:00, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

For the most part I agree. Since you have essentially suggested a full re-write, which is difficult to do, it might be easier to do one section at a time. The LEAD section would be the last one to fix, as that is a summary of the other sections. Legal status is a violation of WP:NOTDIR as well as general no-nos relating to lists. As for history, yes we can organize out to corporate info, products and services, etc. All makes logical sense to me from a high level. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 09:08, 16 July 2025 (UTC)

Thanks! I think I have a good idea of where to take this draft then. I agree with you that one section at a time might be easier.

I will go ahead and draft up a sort of Products or Services section. This will include both currently existing information in the article plus new information from what we agree are reliable sources. Once that is done, I will ping you so you can review it.

I see that CoinDesk, CoinTelegraph have already been discussed on Wikipedia in general. Do you have any general thoughts on The Block, Decrypt, or Coin Central? If not, I may seek some outside opinions on WP:Cryptocurrency.

Thanks for all your thoughts! KB at Binance (talk) 13:48, 30 July 2025 (UTC)

Products and services section proposal

Jtbobwaysf As promised, here is the Products and services section proposal for you! I took some things already in the article that were well sourced (A bulk is the Tokens section) and used that as the foundation for the section. I have added more information only using publications on the WP:RSP list.

Let me know your initial thoughts and if you have any adjustments. Once we tinker around with this, I think then we can take a look at the current article and see what needs to be removed for redundancy.

Extended content

Products and services (section heading)
Binance's core service is a centralized cryptocurrency exchange platform. It also has services such as Binance Wallet, Binance Earn, Binance Academy, and an NFT marketplace.

Exchange (sub-section heading)
Binance runs a cryptocurrency marketplace called Binance Exchange, which is the largest cryptocurrency platform by volume traded, as of 2021. It is the equivalent of the London, New York and Hong Kong stock exchanges combined.

It has hundreds of different crypto assets on the exchange, as of 2022. In January 2018 it was the largest cryptocurrency exchange with a market capitalization of $1.3 billion, a title it had retained as late as April 2021. Binance users can hold their assets on the site's exchange or through custodian Ceffu. In 2024, it allowed some institutional traders to keep assets at independent banks.

Blockchains (sub-section heading)
Binance launched a blockchain network called Binance Smart Chain (BSC) in September 2020. BSC was the most used blockchain by unique active wallets, as of 2021.

In February 2022, Binance Smart Chain was renamed to BNB Chain.

Tokens (sub-section heading)

BNB (Build'N'Build) (sub-sub-section heading)
BNB (Build'N'Build, originally Binance Coin) is Binance's utility token. It is used to pay the exchange's trading fees. In July 2017, 200 million coins were first issued under the name Binance Coin. The token was first based on the Ethereum network. In 2020, it was moved to BNB Smart Chain.

By 2021, BNB had the third highest market capitalization among cryptocurrencies. BNB had 44 validators as of October 2022 and was the fourth largest coin in the world, as of 2023.

BUSD (sub-sub-section heading)
Paxos owned and operated the coin Binance USD (BUSD). It had licensing of the Binance brand for the coin, which was issued on the Ethereum blockchain. In 2022, BUSD became the third largest stablecoin by market capitalization.

The New York Department of Financial Services issued an order to Paxos to stop minting new BUSD tokens in February 2023. At this time, Binance also announced it would also stop minting Binance-Peg BUSD.

Binance-Peg BUSD was a separate, wrapped coin issued on multiple blockchains. Prior to this announcement, Bloomberg reported in January 2023 that Binance-Peg BUSD had been undercollateralized at times during 2020 and 2021 and had a gap larger than $1 billion three separate times.

Other offerings (sub-sub-section heading)
In 2019, the Binance exchange began offering perpetual futures contracts, allowing leverage as high as 125 times the value of the contracts. That same year, the site's first decentralized trading service launched, which allows trades directly from a user's wallet.

The company announced Binance NFT in 2021, as a marketplace and trading platform for NFTs, powered by BNB Smart Chain.

References

Looking forward to hearing your feedback! KB at Binance (talk) 09:41, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

• We dont do products and services generally. Youa are thinking about it with your PR hat on. Put on an encyclopedia hat. First there is no real differnece for us between BNB and BSC, I think this is the same thing that was just renamed. A description of the notable parts of its exchange business is certainly due as well, and might be more encyclopedic. Probably should merge in with all the legal issues, as the legal issues mostly come from the exchange biz. Let me know if this helps. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:32, 12 August 2025 (UTC)

Jtbobwaysf I’m not committed to that section title and am open to any ideas you have. Wanted to throw out "Offerings" or only "Products" as I have seen those around on similar pages and they seem to be standard. As for the subsections within it, maybe those individual tokens don't need sub-subsections and those headings can be removed.

Long-term, I agree with your idea but my thinking was that before tackling the larger Legal status section, get the structure of the article down first before moving things more and more around.

Maybe we should take a step back and sketch out an outline of sections (of course with final determination based on reliable sourcing!) Generally, I was thinking an outline such as the following:

• History

• This already exists

• Company overview

• This does not exist yet but seems standard and some information in the article already seems better suited for this, such as the transition in headquarters.

• Products/Services/Offerings

• Not committed to any heading name, but this is akin to what I presented above and would replace the current Tokens section. Just generally something that defines what Binance as a company is doing, in terms of the main exchange but also other auxiliary offerings.

• Partnerships and acquisitions

• This topic gets mentioned a lot, to the point that it's dragging down other sections. I think relocating all that info into a new section or subsection will help other sections have more direction and therefore will be more clear for readers.

• Global operations

• Since you mentioned that the current Legal status is a violation of WP:NOTDIR and needs to be curtailed, I was thinking part of that could be just presenting it as "Global operations" with a more high level summary of events and current status, rather than the country-by-country look that is currently presented.

Let me know your thoughts! I am most curious if you are still thinking whether what I presented above is suitable for its own section, but in a different heading name and less subsections, or if we should tinker around with the general structure goal some more.

Thanks! KB at Binance (talk) 15:57, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

I am ok with this. Grayfell often disagrees with me, lets see what they think. Thanks! Jtbobwaysf (talk) 23:36, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

This is all far, far too vague. There are some vaguely good proposals here, but this needs to be specific in order to be actionable. A COI editor is not going to be impartial enough to curtail the legal status section. The article did not have a 'Partnerships and acquisitions' section. The closest it had was a '2020–2023: acquisitions and investments' section, but that section was not primarily about that at all. Until a better name is found, I've removed that section subtitle.

To put it another way, we're not going to downplay the company's many well-documented international legal issues just because a PR person asked us nicely. Grayfell (talk) 07:45, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

We dont need a directory of legal status, we should cover the markets where we have enough to say about it that makes it due. I also think we need to WP:AGF that the COI editor is here trying to improve the article. We should not stonewall that attempt. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 10:53, 16 August 2025 (UTC)

AGF is a guideline. WP:NOTPR is policy. Pointing out problems is not 'stonewalling'. Grayfell (talk) 19:23, 18 August 2025 (UTC)

Proposing structure and content without regard to what the best sources have to say never goes well, and goes much worse when driven by a coi. --Hipal (talk) 20:52, 18 August 2025 (UTC)

• We could also consider to just go to a historical structure as we do at Bitfinex. That seems to work well, then we just merge the text into sections by date. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 08:38, 20 August 2025 (UTC)

  Grayfell Yes this is vague but I was hoping to reach a consensus on what is an acceptable structure before presenting it. I understand all of this is dependent on reliable and robust sourcing to back it up, but I wanted to first confirm I am not totally off base on where to aim. I think what I have learned thus far is laying a foundation is important before we start building.

  In regards to the draft that I presented above and its feedback, I changed my draft's subsection name from "Exchange" to "Marketplace". This allows the section/subsection name "Binance exchange" to be used in the future for the idea from Jtbobwaysf to move part of the "Legal status" section to a "Binance Exchange" section."

Adjusted section proposal

• Offerings (section heading)
  

  Binance's core service is a centralized cryptocurrency exchange platform. It also has services such as Binance Wallet, Binance Earn, Binance Academy, and an NFT marketplace.

  Marketplace (sub-section heading)
  

  Binance runs a cryptocurrency marketplace called Binance Exchange, which is the largest cryptocurrency platform by volume traded, as of 2021. It is the equivalent of the London, New York and Hong Kong stock exchanges combined.

  It has hundreds of different crypto assets on the exchange, as of 2022. In January 2018 it had a market capitalization of $1.3 billion,and for the first time, became the largest cryptocurrency exchange Binance users can hold their assets on the site's exchange or through custodian Ceffu. In 2024, it allowed some institutional traders to keep assets at independent banks.

  Tokens (sub-section heading)
  

  Binance has multiple cryptocurrency tokens, including BNB (Build'N'Build, originally Binance Coin) and BUSD (Binance USD). BNB is the utility token, which can be used to pay the exchange's trading fees and it was first issued in July 2017 with 200 million coins under the name Binance Coin. Paxos owned and operated BUSD but had licensing of the Binance brand for the coin. Both tokens were first based on the Ethereum network. Binance also had a Binance-Peg BUSD token, which was a separate, wrapped coin issued on multiple blockchains.

  By 2021, BNB had the third highest market capitalization among cryptocurrencies and it was the fourth largest coin in the world, as of 2023. BUSD became the third largest stablecoin by market capitalization in 2022.

  In 2020, the coin was moved to BNB Smart Chain and it had 44 validators, as of October 2022.

  The New York Department of Financial Services issued an order to Paxos to stop minting new BUSD tokens in February 2023. At this time, Binance also announced it would also stop minting Binance-Peg BUSD. Prior to this announcement, Bloomberg reported in January 2023 that Binance-Peg BUSD had been undercollateralized at times during 2020 and 2021 and had a gap larger than $1 billion three separate times.

  Other offerings (sub-section heading)
  

  In 2019, the Binance exchange began offering perpetual futures contracts, allowing leverage as high as 125 times the value of the contracts. That same year, the site's first decentralized trading service launched, which allows trades directly from a user's wallet.

  The company announced Binance NFT in 2021, as a marketplace and trading platform for NFTs on Binance's blockchain infrastructure. Prior to this, Binance launched a blockchain network called Binance Smart Chain (BSC) in September 2020, which was renamed to BNB Chain in February 2022.

References

• I appreciate any feedback to improve the draft and I understand the scrutiny reviewing volunteer editors need to have.

  While this is being reviewed, I’ll take a look at the structure of Bitfinex since Jtbobwaysf suggested it as a framework to consider. KB at Binance (talk) 13:34, 28 August 2025 (UTC)

The above proposal is too promotional. I could explain why, but I've already done that and you don't seem to understand or care. Also, unlike you, I am not being paid figure out how to game the system for PR purposes.

Bitfinex is not a particularly good article, so it is a poor basis for comparison. All articles should be based on sources about that specific topic, and such sources need to be evaluated in context.

To repeat myself yet again, make small, specific, actionable proposals. Incremental proposals are a much better approach here. Considering using Template:Text diff to propose changing one or two sentences at a time. No, this isn't going to fix the article's organizational issues, at least not very quickly, but to be blunt, you are not qualified or neutral enough to tackle those issues. Wikipedia is still not a platform for promotion, PR, or advocacy. Grayfell (talk) 21:49, 28 August 2025 (UTC)

We dont need this level of nuance here. We are an encyclopedia, and thus really we can just deal with the historical parts. The various product and service nuance proposals are just not that important, just integrate it into history. We are not going to provide a full products and services feature list here at wikipedia. Maybe if various parts of the business are later notable enough to have their own sections or articles, then maybe (like Microsoft Windows and Microsoft Office). But we are no where near that today, maybe a decade from now... Jtbobwaysf (talk) 22:14, 30 August 2025 (UTC)

Headquarters location

The infobox should state “None” for headquarters rather than “Unknown” as the article explicitly states the company has no official headquarters.

Articles consistently describe it as having no fixed base, period, due to its global, regulatory-averse structure. If evidence of an unofficial hub emerges, the infobox could be updated, but no such evidence exists now.

Ap1012 (talk) 22:37, 16 October 2025 (UTC)

Rmv LLM-generated content

In November 2024, FTX filed a lawsuit against Binance Holdings Ltd., Zhao, and other Binance executives, seeking to recover nearly $1.8 billion that FTX alleges was fraudulently transferred. The case centers on a July 2021 stock repurchase transaction in which Binance sold its stakes—approximately 20% of FTX's international unit and 18.4% of its US-based entity—to FTX co-founder Sam Bankman-Fried.

Please rephrase it.

Belle Femme Emmo (talk) 11:35, 6 December 2025 (UTC)

Leadership update

Hello, I would like to request editors add a recent update to the Binance leadership structure.

Binance's co-founder He was named co-CEO alongside Teng in December 2025.

References

This should be updated in the History section as well as in the infobox.

Grayfell and Jtbobwaysf due to your continuing interest in updating this page, I wanted to ping you to see if you had any input. Thanks, KB at Binance (talk) 12:47, 8 December 2025 (UTC)

• I have implemented your changes. Thanks for the update. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 18:25, 8 December 2025 (UTC)

Updates for recent activity

Hello Wikipedia! I wanted to suggest an addition to this article to update it with some recent news coverage about Binance's regulatory status. I would like to suggest the following and suggest it at the end of the History section:

Abu Dhabi’s financial regulator issued three licenses in December 2025, allowing regulated global trading.

References

Pinging Grayfell and Jtbobwaysf due to their continued interest.

Please let me know if there are any questions! KB at Binance (talk) 15:02, 22 December 2025 (UTC)

This is far, far too vague and misrepresents the cited sources for promotional purposes. Per the WSJ: Last week, Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange, said it had received full approval from Abu Dhabi’s financial regulator to operate its global trading platform from the capital. A state-backed Emirati investment firm bought a $2 billion stake in Binance earlier this year. There are several other mentions of Binance in that article, but those are about Trump's pardon and associated quid pro quo shenanigans with World Liberty Financial. To only use a source for vaguely promotional details while ignoring the meat of the source is inappropriate. The Bloomberg source also mentions both the pardon, and the size of UAE's investment. Grayfell (talk) 20:22, 22 December 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for the input! The information outlined ($2 billion investment; presidential pardon; World Liberty Financial) already existed in the article so I thought the most appropriate request was for the basic fact of this new development.

Additionally, presenting modified language could have been construed as promotional as well. In fact, I did not adjust the UAE investment language in my proposed user space draft for this reason. I am making every attempt to remove my inherent bias (due to being an employee) in all of these requests.

However, this may be moot as another editor seems to have implemented this update. KB at Binance (talk) 16:17, 13 January 2026 (UTC)

POV issues

Seems there are numerous POV issues in this article. I was somewhat ignoring it due to the questions of distraction of above, but took a look at it today. We can go through them one by one as they arise, seems all to be in the same general POV that binance is bad, etc.

• Money Laundering in WP:LEAD @Thenightaway: you added this which states that Binance pled guilty to "money laundering charges". Do we have a preponderance of sources for that? DOJ said: "Binance Holdings Limited (Binance), the entity that operates the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, Binance.com, pleaded guilty today and has agreed to pay over $4 billion to resolve the Justice Department’s investigation into violations related to the Bank Secrecy Act (BSA), failure to register as a money transmitting business, and the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA)." Do we have agreement that this is going to be summarized into money laundering? I am not sure it meets the test of money laundering in WP:WIKIVOICE and certainly the WSJ stating it wouldnt be sufficient to make the claim in wikivoice. Maybe you can cite some sort of policy that states that we dont just link to the relevant act(s) that the DOJ states they violated? Thanks!

Jtbobwaysf (talk) 06:31, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Those are laws that specifically prohibit moneylaundering. All reliable sources describe Binance as having pleaded guilty to anti-moneylaundering violations: Reuters, BBC News, NY Times, FT, Washington Post. Wikipedia should follow the RS. Thenightaway (talk) 13:44, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

These are laws in the US that prohibit money laundering among other things. For the company Binance we don't need be particularly careful, but when it relates to Zhao then we have to defer to WP:BLP as we regularly see issues today where the media promotes one interpretation that is separate and distinct from the fact and we dont promote those POVs to the lead, for example Bank_Secrecy_Act#Sanctions, and Wachovia, and HSBC. Even if the media intrepreation is in fact correct, it is still WP:UNDUE for summary in the WP:LEAD. Probably every major financial institution has BSA violations at this point in time and we are not summarizing those in the lead, Binance is really no different from a global financial institution at this point and should be treated neutrally as we treat other large corps. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 22:46, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Early history request

Hello editors! I have some suggested updates for this article that I will be presenting in bite sized chunks, for transparency they will be coming from this user space draft.

I plan to just start at the top and work my way through the article.

For the first request, I wanted to start with the early history and propose replacing the following content with what is presented below.

−

CEO Changpeng Zhao 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 contract|spot]] trading between [[Fiat money|fiat]] and [[digital asset]]s. He was hired at this position in 2014 by [[Yi He]], with whom he co-founded Binance several years later. The company was founded in 2017 in [[China]] but moved its servers and headquarters out of the country in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017. Zhao asked He to join Binance, and she helped rewrite parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering.

+

([[Changpeng Zhao | Changpeng "CZ" Zhao]] and [[Yi He]] cofounded Binance in 2017 after the two worked together at previous [[cryptocurrency]] companies. He wrote parts of the [[white paper]] for Binance's $15 million [[initial coin offering]] (ICO). In July 2017, 200 million coins of the utility token Binance Coin, designed to pay the exchange's trading fees, were released. The token was originally based on the [[Ethereum]] network and later renamed to Build'N'Build (BNB). The company began operations in [[Shanghai]] and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017. Binance set up in [[Japan]] and sought licensing to operate, but once again had to relocate due to regulations. In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in [[Malta]]. Binance announced more expansions in 2018, including plans to secure a license for operations in [[Jersey]].

What is removed and why:

• Zhao's personal history pre-Binance, as that is more pertinent to the article about him

What is added and why:

• Release of Binance Coin in 2017, as this is a key milestone that is missing in this section.
• Background on Binance Coin to contextualize it

What is rewritten and why:

• Zhao and He's background to streamline information.
• Headquarters relocation to provide more context and milestones.

References

As always, pinging Grayfell and Jtbobwaysf due to their continued interest.

Let me know if you have any thoughts. KB at Binance (talk) 16:19, 13 January 2026 (UTC)

• I think it would be helpful if you added sources inline in text so we can look. Seems you also removed some text, please explain. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 22:32, 13 January 2026 (UTC)

Revised request

Here is the diff with inline citations:

Inline citation diff

−

CEO Changpeng Zhao 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 contract|spot]] trading between [[Fiat money|fiat]] and [[digital asset]]s.<ref name="Forbes2018">{{Cite news |last=Ambler |first=Pamela |date=7 February 2018 |title=From Zero To Crypto Billionaire In Under A Year: Meet The Founder Of Binance |work=Forbes |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/pamelaambler/2018/02/07/changpeng-zhao-binance-exchange-crypto-cryptocurrency/#390a79b81eee}}</ref> He was hired at this position in 2014 by [[Yi He]], with whom he co-founded Binance several years later.<ref name="Bloomberg - Crypto's Most Powerful Woman Speaks Out as Crisis Rocks Binance">{{Cite Q|Q120053402|access-date=2023-06-28}}</ref>The company was founded in 2017 in [[China]] but moved its servers and headquarters out of the country in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Xiao |first=Eva |date=30 November 2017 |title=Three months after launch, this unbanked crypto exchange made $7.5m in profit |work=[[Tech in Asia]] |url=https://www.techinasia.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-binance}}</ref> Zhao asked He to join Binance, and she helped rewrite parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering.<ref name="Bloomberg - Crypto's Most Powerful Woman Speaks Out as Crisis Rocks Binance" /> |([[Changpeng Zhao

+

[[Changpeng Zhao | Changpeng "CZ" Zhao]] and [[Yi He]] cofounded Binance in 2017 after the two worked together at previous [[cryptocurrency]] companies. He wrote parts of the [[white paper]] for Binance's $15 million [[initial coin offering]] (ICO).<ref name="Shen 2023">{{cite news |last1=Shen |first1=Muyao |last2=Lee |first2=Justina |title=Crypto's Most Powerful Woman Speaks Out as Crisis Rocks Binance |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2023-06-28/binance-co-founder-yi-he-on-crypto-regulation-and-changpeng-cz-zhao |access-date=23 October 2025 |work=Bloomberg |date=June 28, 2023 |language=en}}</ref> In July 2017, 200 million coins of the utility token Binance Coin, designed to pay the exchange's trading fees, were released. The token was originally based on the [[Ethereum]] network and later renamed to Build'N'Build (BNB).<ref name="Kharif 2022">{{cite news |last1=Kharif |first1=Olga |last2=Shukla |first2=Sidhartha |title=A $568 Million Hack of Binance Coin Roils Crypto Sector Anew |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-10-06/bnb-chain-says-bsc-temporarily-paused-on-irregular-activity |access-date=8 August 2025 |work=Bloomberg News |date=6 Oct 2022 |archive-url=https://archive.ph/pKDxo |archive-date=7 Oct 2022}}</ref><ref name="Kharif 2019">{{cite news |last1=Kharif |first1=Olga |title=Hottest Crypto Coin's Massive Rally Echoes Bitcoin's Glory Days |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-15/hottest-crypto-coin-s-massive-rally-echoes-bitcoin-s-glory-days |access-date=8 August 2025 |work=Bloomberg News |date=15 March 2019 |archive-url=https://archive.ph/b0Nae |archive-date=8 August 2025 |language=en}}</ref><ref name="Bambysheva 2023">{{cite news |last1=Bambysheva |first1=Nina |title=Binance Looks Beyond The Dollar For Stablecoin Replacement |url=https://www.forbes.com/sites/digital-assets/2023/02/18/binance-looks-beyond-the-dollar-for-stablecoin-replacement/ |access-date=1 August 2025 |work=Forbes |date=14 Feb 2023 |archive-url=https://archive.ph/vgvHT#selection-519.0-536.0 |archive-date=6 Sep 2023 |language=en}}</ref>The company began operations in [[Shanghai]] and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017.<ref>{{Cite news |last=Xiao |first=Eva |date=30 November 2017 |title=Three months after launch, this unbanked crypto exchange made $7.5m in profit |work=Tech in Asia |url=https://www.techinasia.com/cryptocurrency-exchange-binance}}</ref> Binance set up in [[Japan]] and sought licensing to operate, but once again had to relocate due to regulations.<ref name="Bloomberg201803">{{Cite news |last=Nakamura |first=Yuji |date=2018-03-23 |title=World's Biggest Cryptocurrency Exchange Is Heading to Malta |language=en |work=Bloomberg |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-23/the-world-s-biggest-cryptocurrency-exchange-is-moving-to-malta |access-date=2018-03-24}}</ref> In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in [[Malta]].<ref name="Bloomberg201803">{{Cite news |last=Nakamura |first=Yuji |date=2018-03-23 |title=World's Biggest Cryptocurrency Exchange Is Heading to Malta |language=en |work=Bloomberg |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-23/the-world-s-biggest-cryptocurrency-exchange-is-moving-to-malta |access-date=2018-03-24}}</ref> Binance announced more expansions in 2018, including plans to secure a license for operations in [[Jersey]].<ref>{{Cite news |date=2018-06-11 |title=Crypto Giant Binance to Offer Euro Trading Pairs This Year |language=en |work=Bloomberg |url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-11/crypto-giant-binance-to-offer-euro-trading-pairs-this-year |access-date=2018-06-14}}</ref>

And here is what proposed text would look like, with references

Extended content

Changpeng "CZ" Zhao and Yi He cofounded Binance in 2017 after the two worked together at previous cryptocurrency companies. He wrote parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering (ICO). In July 2017, 200 million coins of the utility token Binance Coin, designed to pay the exchange's trading fees, were released. The token was originally based on the Ethereum network and later renamed to Build'N'Build (BNB).

The company began operations in Shanghai and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017. Binance set up in Japan and sought licensing to operate, but once again had to relocate due to regulations. In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in Malta. Binance announced more expansions in 2018, including plans to secure a license for operations in Jersey.

References

Here is the more robust breakdown that was requested:

• CEO Changpeng Zhao"

• Status: Rewritten to to "Changpeng "CZ" Zhao"
• Why: to provide his commonly known name and add a wikilink.

• 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.

• Status: Removed
• Why: This information is not about Binance.

• He was hired at this position in 2014 by Yi He, with whom he co-founded Binance several years later.

• Status: Rewritten to "and Yi He cofounded Binance in 2017 after the two worked together at previous cryptocurrency companies."
• Why: 1) retains information of how two cofounders met while streamlining it to remove tangential background information better suited to the respective BLPs articles about each founder 2)introduces the founding year of Binance earlier in the section.

• The company was founded in 2017 in China but moved its servers and headquarters out of the country in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.

• Status: Rewritten to "The company began operations in Shanghai and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017. Binance set up in Japan and sought licensing to operate, but once again had to relocate due to regulations. In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in Malta. Binance announced more expansions in 2018, including plans to secure a license for operations in Jersey."
• Why: Gives further information on the moving headquarters locations beyond the 2017 move out of China. Provides more specific details on the 2017 ban.

• Zhao asked He to join Binance, and she helped rewrite parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering.

• Status: Moved and Rewritten to "He wrote parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering (ICO)."
• Why: 1) moves this above the headquarter information so that the information is in order chronologically 2) adds wikilinks 3) general language rewrite to fit with the flow of new placement

• In July 2017, 200 million coins of the utility token Binance Coin, designed to pay the exchange's trading fees, were released. The token was originally based on the Ethereum network and later renamed to Build'N'Build (BNB).

• Status: Added
• Why: 1) "200 million coins" is an encyclopedic fact missing from the article as a whole 2) the launch itself is a missing milestone from the History section. 3) Binance changed the coin's names and networks throughout the years, so this establishes the point-in-time fact and changes noted later in the History section, to fit with chronology.

Jtbobwaysf Please let me know if this satisfies your request for more explanation! KB at Binance (talk) 13:59, 16 January 2026 (UTC)

These changes do not appear to be an improvement, and this wording is less neutral. You can continue to discuss this change, but do not re-add this template until consensus has changed. Grayfell (talk) 23:43, 13 January 2026 (UTC)

Hm... I a agree with Grayfell here.

I have WP:NPOV concerns with both the removal of material and the change in phrasing. In particular, some of the rewrites change the implied meaning rather than just reorganizing information.

For example this:

The company was founded in 2017 in China but moved its servers and headquarters out of the country in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.

is rewritten as:

The company began operations in Shanghai and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017.

The original text explicitly links the relocation to the impending Chinese ban, while the revised version removes the cause and effect and presents it as coincidental or preemptive with an explanation. That's a substantive change in meaning, not just a stylistic one.

As a way forward, it may be better to focus on adding well-sourced material rather than replacing or re-framing existing text. ◦ Sibshops (talk) 16:42, 2 February 2026 (UTC)

To add, I don't think the circumstances leading up to the company founding should be removed outright. Pre-founding context about founders is commonly included in wikipedia articles because it explains how a company came together, even if it technically predates the company itself.

It's consistent with how early history is handled in many technology articles, for example History of Apple Inc. or Google, where founder background and pre-incorporation are included for context. ◦ Sibshops (talk) 17:02, 2 February 2026 (UTC)

Sometimes we have some background on a founder in the company lead. But if the same identical content is also in his personal article, there isnt really a reason to duplicate it. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:27, 2 February 2026 (UTC)

@Sibshops: I looked at the source for the move out of China and it actually attributes the move to luck. "The company was also lucky – a week before the ban was announced, Zhao’s team moved all their servers out of China." Do we have other sources for this? If we don't, actually we are not being neutral on this text. Maybe they are other sources that attribute this timeframe in the more POV based view we use now, so we would need a source for that. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 22:09, 2 February 2026 (UTC)

Ah fair, if the page doesn't reflect the sources, then I have no issue with rewording that part. I also have no issue trimming the background too. ◦ Sibshops (talk) 00:44, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

I found a stronger source, WP:REUTERS, which documents the timeline more clearly. I also updated the text in question as well. ◦ Sibshops (talk) 13:54, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Also, I didn't add the rest of the paragraph as proposed in the edit request. Those appear to be 2018 events and wouldn't fit in the 2017 section.

Binance set up in Japan and sought licensing to operate, but once again had to relocate due to regulations. In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in Malta. Binance announced more expansions in 2018, including plans to secure a license for operations in Jersey.

◦ Sibshops (talk) 14:11, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

Looks fine to me. I just felt the older content was not NPOV as it implied they were running away. I think the other COI editor objects (or at least has in the past objected) to more information relating to the location, but I do not share that objection. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 21:19, 3 February 2026 (UTC)

I think the initially proposed wording was a bit confusing.

The company began operations in Shanghai and moved its servers out before the country banned ICOs in 2017.

• The statement is geographically confusing. Shanghai is a city and readers have to infer either China or Mainland China here. It isn't clear where "moved out" went from and to.
• Banned ICOs is unnecessarily too specific, banning ICOs was part of a broader cryptocurrency crackdown.

◦ Sibshops (talk) 18:31, 4 February 2026 (UTC)

Sib, I think we should go with your proposed wording. Jtbobwaysf (talk) 23:24, 4 February 2026 (UTC)