In the wake of Sam Bankman-Fried’s demise, all eyes are on Changpeng Zhao, the CEO of the biggest and most influential cryptocurrency exchange Binance.
Who is this man behind the trade many think is at least partially responsible for sinking FTX? My colleague Jeff Roberts and former colleague Yvonne Lau go deep with an exhaustive feature for our latest magazine issue. Through an interview with Zhao as well as conversations with people who have known him and extensive reviews of Chinese-language media, Roberts and Lau paint a picture of who CZ really is, how he built his business, and they also explore the big gaps in the public record regarding both Zhao’s background and how his company operates.
From their story:
Fortune uncovered new insights into the two worlds that shaped Zhao’s identity: the Canada of his formative years and China, where he returned as a “sea turtle” and rode the wave of Shanghai’s emergence at the forefront of global business during the first part of this century.
Absorbing the lessons of both places, Zhao mastered many of the cutthroat business tactics that prevailed during the wild early years of China’s tech scene, while retaining the reassuring, nonthreatening affect of an average Canadian—a demeanor that deflects attention from his tactical guile.
Until recently, Zhao spoke frequently to crypto and business media, but in the past few months, he has given up such appearances entirely—a decision based on the fraught regulatory environment and on frustration with what Binance regards as media mischaracterizations of the company and Zhao. He broke his recent silence to speak with Fortune, sharing many details of his life that haven’t been previously reported. The interview provides firsthand insight into how Zhao runs his business. It also reveals how his rise dovetailed with broader trends in the Chinese diaspora, and how a brilliant but aloof father may have influenced the emergence of Binance as the big dog of crypto.
And how does Zhao compare to his former nemesis, SBF?
Zhao and Bankman-Fried were the two most dominant figures in crypto during the boom that ran from 2020 through early 2022, and there are some notable parallels in their biographies. Most obviously, both are the children of academics—though Zhao’s father was only on the periphery of the university world. Bankman-Fried, by contrast, grew up as the child of two Stanford law professors who owned a fine house on campus and enjoyed life at the top of the academic pecking order.
Today, of course, the two men’s situations are very different. Bankman-Fried is still in his parents’ house as he awaits trial on a spate of fraud charges that could see him go to prison for life. Zhao, meanwhile, is now a father himself after deciding to become a parent with Binance cofounder Yi He, who is now the company’s chief customer officer; they have two toddler-age children together.
It’s easy to imagine Zhao resenting his rival’s privilege and sense of entitlement. Bankman-Fried has taunted him on Twitter multiple times—including suggesting, in the summer of 2022, that Zhao would be arrested if he stepped on U.S. shores. (Binance says Zhao has visited Canada several times in recent years, including for his father’s funeral, but maintained a very low profile while doing so.) But Zhao claims he feels no personal animosity toward his onetime rival.
“He just felt to me like one of those young kids who were smart, who were brilliant, but who’s very aggressive,” Zhao says. He tells Fortune that he has met Bankman-Fried three to five times, and viewed him primarily as a client, since the latter’s Alameda Research hedge fund used Binance as a trading platform.
As of mid-April, Binance appears to have weathered the twin headwinds of a crypto market collapse in the wake of FTX’s implosion and regulators’ increasingly aggressive attempts to go after the company. Though its finances remain a black box, blockchain data shows Binance has gained market share from rivals in recent months, and its trading volume is up—and presumably its revenue as well—because of a rebound in the price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.
Meanwhile, Zhao continues to hew to a position that he and his company are decentralized and belong to no country at all. From this perspective, he has transcended the influence of China, Canada, and everywhere else, to become a truly stateless individual.
Nonetheless, Zhao the globe-trotting crypto baron remains very much human; like the rest of us, he can never totally escape where he came from and the forces that shaped him. And in Zhao’s case, those forces may have less to do with geography than with family.
You can read the full story here.
Until Monday,
Jessica Mathews
Twitter: @jessicakmathews
Email: jessica.mathews@fortune.com
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