Binance France has new shareholders who own 100% of the company in equal shares. The move was necessary after the country’s Financial Markets Authority (AMF) sent a warning to the company in December.
According to a blog post, the AMF informed Binance France that it needed to take action in response to issues that arose between the original beneficial owner and the US Department of Justice, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and the Financial Crimes Enforcement of the Treasury Department. Network. . In other words, former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao can no longer own the company.
The message stated that Zhao had already retired from the company. He pleaded guilty to the charges against him in the United States in November and was sentenced to four months in prison in the United States, although he has not yet started his prison sentence.
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Binance France did not provide the names of the new beneficiaries but indicated that they were members of the founding team of Binance. Babers Media Service said they were Lihua Hu and Yulong Yan. Little information is available on either individual.
The Binance whitepaper reportedly identifies Yan as Alan Yan, senior product manager. Yan was also a co-founder of Bijie Tech, the company Zhao founded before Binance to provide software for cryptocurrency exchanges. This Shanghai-based company was closed in 2017. Lihua was not mentioned in this document.
Under the Markets in Crypto Assets (MiCA) Regulations, a company licensed in one EU country can license all 27 member states. Binance reportedly received approval from the Arab Monetary Fund in May 2022, after operating illegally in the country since 2020. It was also reportedly under investigation for anti-money laundering violations before Zhao be charged in the United States.
Binance France also struggled to find a banking partner in France after the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) filed suit against the company in March 2023. Binance France CEO Stephanie Kaposiouras joined a wave of executives leaving the company in October 2023.
In June, Binance was denied a virtual asset service provider license in the Netherlands and regulators shut down its operations in Belgium later that same month.
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