Ki Young Ju, the CEO of blockchain analytics firm CryptoQuant, has expressed his support for former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) as his four-month prison sentence nears its conclusion.<\/p>\n
Zhao began serving his sentence in June 2024 after admitting to breaches of the US Bank Secrecy Act (BSA).<\/p>\n
His guilty plea involved not preventing money laundering on Binance, resulting in a $4.3 billion penalty for the company and a $50 million fine for Zhao himself. His imprisonment, which started<\/a> in June 2024, will end on September 29.<\/p>\n In a recent statement posted on X, the CryptoQuant CEO acknowledged<\/a> the Binance executive\u2019s mistakes while also emphasizing his contributions. \u201cDon\u2019t underestimate CZ. He deserves respect,\u201d\u00a0 he wrote, elaborating on the broader societal perspective.<\/p>\n The statement noted that when an industry\u2019s intrinsic value falls short of the capital it has absorbed, society tends to view this as a \u201csin.\u201d In such scenarios, the most influential figures are often held responsible for the industry\u2019s shortcomings.<\/p>\n He further explained that the crypto sector, like other young and immature ones, has faced its share of \u201cgrowing pains,\u201d including rampant crime like hacks and frauds, which have hurt its growth. In his view, Zhao has become a scapegoat for some of the industry\u2019s failings, but this should not overshadow his role in its development.<\/p>\n \u201cWhile he has certainly made mistakes, his detention also carries a vicarious element, representing the industry\u2019s growing pains.\u201d He concluded by acknowledging that without Binance, the crypto space would not have attracted the global liquidity it benefits from today.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, there has been some backlash from the community following the statement. BlockTower Capital\u2019s Ari Paul alleged<\/a> that CZ\u00a0 committed all the same crimes as Sam Bankman-Fried and that he was only spared a harsher sentence due to fears of his ability to bribe foreign governments and the value of the information he could provide to authorities.<\/p>\n He also claimed<\/a> that CZ\u2019s actions had \u201cruined a lot of lives,\u201d leading to the \u201cvanishing\u201d of several Binance executives, and had caused significant harm to the industry as a whole.<\/p>\n However, Ju has countered these accusations, stating<\/a> that the exchange never used customer funds and that on-chain data shows the differences in wallet management between Binance and FTX. He also pointed out that the exchange\u2019s CEO was not charged with using customer funds but rather with abetting money laundering.<\/p>\n \u201cIf CZ were truly the criminal you\u2019re suggesting, the authorities wouldn\u2019t have released him, even if a deal had been offered, as you mentioned.\u201d<\/p>\n Ju also argues<\/a> that the suspicion surrounding Binance is similar to the FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) surrounding Tether, as there is no conclusive evidence to support the accusations.<\/p>\n The post CryptoQuant CEO Ki Young Ju Backs Former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao as Release Nears<\/a> appeared first on CryptoPotato<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ki Young Ju, the CEO of blockchain analytics firm CryptoQuant, has expressed his support for former Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao (CZ) as his four-month prison sentence nears its conclusion. Zhao began serving his sentence in June 2024 after admitting to breaches of the US Bank Secrecy Act (BSA). Ki Young Ju\u2019s Statement His guilty plea […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":8940,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-discovery"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8940"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mycryptomania.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Community Backlash<\/h2>\n