Trump pardons Binance founder Zhao who admitted allowing money laundering, has ties with his family crypto venture

Zhao admitted to failing to stop criminals from using his platform to illegally move money

Updated on: Oct 23, 2025, 23:48:41 IST

By HT News Desk

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US President Donald Trump has used his special powers to pardon Binance's Changpeng Zhao, founder of the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange, who was convicted and served jail time for money laundering via his platform.

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, also known as CZ, at a conference in Hong Kong in August 2025. (Tyrone Siu/Reuters Photo)

What Zhao was convicted for

He was accused of failing to stop criminals from using his platform to illegally move money connected to child sex abuse, drug trafficking and terrorism.
Zhao pleaded guilty to one count of failing to maintain an anti-money-laundering program in late 2023, and served a four-month prison sentence for it in 2024.
Zhao, while pleading guilty in the money-laundering case, had told the court, "I failed here… I deeply regret my failure, and I am sorry.”
He had asked Trump for a pardon previously, and the White House now says Zhao was persecuted by the Joe Biden administration.

Deep ties to Trump family venture

Changpeng Zhao has deep ties to World Liberty Financial, a crypto venture that the Republican president and his sons Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr. launched in September, news agency AP reported.

Trump’s most recent financial disclosure report says he made more than $57 million last year from this venture, which has launched ‘USD1’, a ‘stablecoin’ form of crypto or virtual currency that's pegged at a 1-to-1 ratio to the US dollar.

World Liberty Financial also recently announced that an investment fund in the United Arab Emirates would be using $2 billion worth of this ‘USD1’ coin to purchase a stake in Binance.

Zhao also has publicly said that he had asked Trump for a pardon that could nullify his conviction.

What White House says on Zhao pardon

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement on Thursday that the Biden administration prosecuted Zhao out of a “desire to punish the cryptocurrency industry". She said there were “no allegations of fraud or identifiable victims".

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