#TradingTypes101 2022
2013–2017: company beginnings and move out of China
CEO Changpeng Zhao founded Fusion Systems in 2005 in Shanghai; the company built high-frequency trading systems for stockbrokers. In 2013, he joined Blockchain.info as the third member of the cryptocurrency wallet's team. He also worked at OKCoin as CTO for less than a year, a platform for spot trading between fiat and digital assets.[13] He was hired at this position in 2014 by Yi He, with whom he co-founded Binance several years later.[4]
The company was founded in 2017 in China but moved its servers and headquarters out of the country in advance of the Chinese government's ban on cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.[14] Zhao asked He to join Binance, and she helped rewrite parts of the white paper for Binance's $15 million initial coin offering.[4]
2018–2019: launch of stablecoin and security breach
In January 2018 it was the largest cryptocurrency exchange with a market capitalization of $1.3 billion,[15] a title it had retained as late as April 2021, despite competition from Coinbase, among others.[16] In March 2018, Binance announced its intentions to open an office in Malta after stricter regulations in Japan and China.[17] In April 2018, Binance signed a memorandum of understanding with the government of Bermuda.[18] Months later, a similar memorandum was signed with the Malta Stock Exchange to develop a platform for trading security tokens.[19] In 2019, the company announced Binance Jersey, a Jersey-based exchange which offers fiat-to-cryptocurrency pairs, including the Euro and the British pound.[20]
In June 2018, Binance and three other firms raised $65 million for sports blockchain company Chiliz.[21] In July 2018, Binance acquired Trust Wallet, a decentralized cryptocurrency wallet for an undisclosed sum composed of a mixture of cash, Binance stock, and BNB tokens.[22] In August 2018, Binance along with three other large exchanges raised $32 million to fund the stablecoin project Terra. This was intended to facilitate
