Binance’s billionaire founder, Changpeng Zhao, has been sentenced to four months in prison in the United States for money laundering.
The sentence was handed down by U.S. District Judge Richard Jones in Seattle on Tuesday, April 30, following Zhao’s guilty plea to violations of anti-money laundering laws.
Prosecutors had sought a jail term of up to three years for Zhao when he appeared in a Seattle court, as part of the Justice Department’s crackdown on misconduct in the cryptocurrency industry.
As part of his plea deal, Zhao agreed to step down as CEO of Binance and pay a $50 million fine for failing to maintain an effective anti-money laundering program, along with sanctions violations related to users in Iran, Cuba, Syria, and Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
