On Friday, Changpeng Zhao will step out onto the streets of Long Beach, California as a free man for the first time in months. Since April, Zhao—who everyone knows as "CZ"—has been in federal custody after agreeing to return to the U.S. from Dubai in order to serve a four-month sentence for failing to implement proper anti-money laundering controls at Binance, the giant crypto exchange he founded. During this time Zhao spent around two months at a minimum security prison in the California desert before being transferred to halfway house in Long Beach where, according to a prison official, he would have been able to make supervised excursions and even go to movies.
Now, Zhao will have many more options as he returns to society with a personal fortune of approximately $60 billion—the 25th biggest in the world—and his legal troubles behind him. Zhao did not immediately respond to a direct message inquiry about his plans, and his lawyer told Fortune that he did not wish to be interviewed on the day of his release. Nonetheless, it's possible to make some informed guesses about his next moves.
