Binance Looking for the Next Heir to CZ Amid Regulatory Woes

The latest report in the town is that crypto exchange Binance is looking for the next heir to CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ), said sources familiar with the matter.

This comes at a time when Binance has been facing major regulatory headwinds. Last month itself, Binance’s payments partners in Australia decided to cut off ties with the exchange. This prevented Binance Australia customers from making further deposits on the exchange followed by a massive frenzy of withdrawals. Binance announced that it has ceased all AUD trading pairs on the platform.

As per sources, Richard Teng shall replace CZ as the CEO of Binance going ahead. The sources also said that the succession issue to CZ has taken urgency since amid the growing regulatory scrutiny of the crypto exchange.

Binance is also at loggerheads currently with the US regulators as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) sued Binance and Zhao earlier this year in March, for violations of derivatives regulations. Reportedly, four other US agencies have been investigating and bringing enforcement action against Binance.

Despite these headwinds, Binance still handles more trading than all the other top centralized crypto exchanges combined.

Binance and Richard Teng

52-year-old Singaporean Richard Teng has been instrumental in Binance’s meteoric rise over the past two years. Last month in May, Binance also appointed Teng as the head of all markets outside the US.

Previously, Teng has worked in senior positions at the Singapore central bank as well as Abu Dhabi’s international free-trade zone. Campbell Harvey, a finance professor at Duke University said: Teng’s appointment “checks the boxes for trust. Binance is signaling that they want to work with the regulators.”

Last month in May 2023, Binance also exited the Canadian market stating that the new regulations made the market “no longer tenable” for it. One of Teng’s first tasks was to help Binance secure a license in Singapore.“That actually didn’t work out, but Richard had done phenomenal work during that process,” Zhao said. However, this didn’t hurt Teng’s prospects at Binance.

Teng has worked for two decades at government agencies and holds a good grip on handling regulatory matters.