London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Friday, Oct 17, 2025

Leaked Document Reveals Binance’s Elaborate Scheme To Evade Regulators

Leaked Document Reveals Binance’s Elaborate Scheme To Evade Regulators

Binance Holdings Limited, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, conceived of an elaborate corporate structure designed to intentionally deceive regulators and surreptitiously profit from crypto investors in the United States, according to a document thought to be created by its senior executives and obtained by Forbes.

Cayman Islands-based Binance is currently responsible for about $10 billion in total crypto trades per day and its founder and CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao is one of the few known cryptocurrency billionaires.

The 2018 document details plans for a yet-unnamed U.S. company dubbed the “Tai Chi entity,” in an allusion to the Chinese martial art whose approach is built around the principle of “yield and overcome,” or using an opponent’s own weight against him.

While Binance appears to have gone out of its way to submit to U.S. regulations by establishing a compliant subsidary, Binance.US, an ulterior motive is now apparent. Unlike its creator Binance, Binance.US, which is open to American investors, does not allow highly leveraged crypto-derivatives trading, which is regulated in the U.S.

The leaked Tai Chi document, a slideshow believed to have been seen by senior Binance executives, is a strategic plan to execute a bait and switch. While the then-unnamed entity set up operations in the United States to distract regulators with feigned interest in compliance, measures would be put in place to move revenue in the form of licensing fees and more to the parent company, Binance.

All the while, potential customers would be taught how to evade geographic restrictions while technological work-arounds were put in place.

Forbes reached out to Binance founder CZ as well as its chief compliance officer Samuel Lim about the leaked document and didn’t receive a response to our questions. Binance.US CEO Catherine Coley and Harry Zhou, the person identified as creating the document, also didn’t comment. [After the article was published CZ responded with several tweets claiming that the story was incorrect and that the document was not created by a current or former employee. He further wrote that “Binance has always operated within the boundaries of the law.” Ed note: Chief compliance officer Lim had previously sent an email to Forbes confirming that Zhou had been a Binance employee.]

The source of the document, whose identity we’ve agreed not to reveal, says it was first presented to CZ in Q4 2018 by Binance mergers and acquisitions manager Jared Gross, an attorney who Forbes believes is actually the exchange’s general counsel.

The source says the document was created by former Binance employee Harry Zhou, a serial entrepreneur, who is the co-founder of Koi Trading, a San Francisco-based cryptocurrency exchange partially owned by Binance. The file is named “Presentation 2” so there may have been other strategies being considered. Still, an analysis of the document reveals that many of the specifics outlined within it, are already in place.

“U.S. Enforcement Mitigation”


The strategy document has four main components, Goals, Proposed Corporate Structure, Regulator Engagement Plans and Long Term License Plans. The first goal, enforcement mitigation, is designed to minimize the impact of U.S. regulation. It explicitly mentions the need to undermine the ability of “anti-money laundering and U.S. sanctions enforcement” to detect illicit activity.

More specifically, it describes a detailed strategy for distracting the U.S. Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), and the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS).

To do this, the document advocates for participating in the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Cornerstone Program for detecting weaknesses in the financial systems. A representative of the Department tells Forbes that Binance.US did participate in the Cornerstone program, as a standard part of the process of becoming a Money Service Business, but declined to comment further.

Interestingly, Binance itself is now a client of the DHS-funded CipherTrace, based in Menlo Park, California, one of the first security firms with technology explicitly designed to investigate on-chain transactions of the exchange’s own cryptocurrency. Another CipherTrace client is the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which signed a one-year deal with CipherTrace this July.

While the SEC declined to comment as to whether or not its engagement of CipherTrace was part of a larger investigation into Binance or Binace.US, the contract explicitly states that one of the main reasons for selecting CipherTrace is it is “the only known blockchain forensics and risk intelligence tool that can support the Binance coin (BNB) and all tokens on the Binance network.”

“Insulate Binance from US enforcement”


The proposed corporate structure section starts off with a bold bullet point, “Key Binance Personnel continue to operate from non-U.S. location to avoid enforcement risks.” In the same section the document details how the Tai Chi entity would act as a magnet for regulatory inquiries, and should be willing “to accept nominal fines in exchange for enforcement forbearance.”

Though not readily apparent, the document reveals that the Cayman Islands-based holding company will be connected to an unnamed Delaware C-corporation and the separate Tai Chi entity (see image above), showing how revenue from the U.S. business could be funneled back to Binance, the parent company. “License and service fees paid by the US Service company to Binance are functionally US-sourced trading fees,” the document states.

But unlike an actual subsidiary whose parent company could be held accountable for regulatory violations, the Tai Chi entity would have little more than a contractual relationship, further “insulat [ing] Binance from U.S. enforcement,” according to the document. Essentially, it would be a decoy.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
U.S. Chamber Sues Trump Over $100,000 H-1B Visa Fee
Shenzhen Expo Spotlights China’s Quantum Step in Semiconductor Self-Reliance
China Accelerates to the Forefront in Global Nuclear Fusion Race
Yachts, Private Jets, and a Picasso Painting: Exposed as 'One of the Largest Frauds in History'
Australia’s Wedgetail Spies Aid NATO Response as Russian MiGs Breach Estonian Airspace
McGowan Urges Chalmers to Cut Spending Over Tax Hike to Close $20 Billion Budget Gap
Victoria Orders Review of Transgender Prison Placement Amid Safety Concerns for Female Inmates
U.S. Treasury Mobilises New $20 Billion Debt Facility to Stabilise Argentina
French Business Leaders Decry Budget as Macron’s Pro-Enterprise Promise Undermined
Trump Claims Modi Pledged India Would End Russian Oil Imports Amid U.S. Tariff Pressure
Surging AI Startup Valuations Fuel Bubble Concerns Among Top Investors
Australian Punter Archie Wilson Tears Up During Nebraska Press Conference, Sparking Conversation on Male Vulnerability
Australia Confirms U.S. Access to Upgraded Submarine Shipyard Under AUKUS Deal
“Firepower” Promised for Ukraine as NATO Ministers Meet — But U.S. Tomahawks Remain Undecided
Brands Confront New Dilemma as Extremists Adopt Fashion Labels
The Sydney Sweeney and Jeans Storm: “The Outcome Surpassed Our Wildest Dreams”
Erika Kirk Delivers Moving Tribute at White House as Trump Awards Charlie Presidential Medal of Freedom
British Food Influencer ‘Big John’ Detained in Australia After Visa Dispute
ScamBodia: The Chinese Fraud Empire Shielded by Cambodia’s Ruling Elite
French PM Suspends Macron’s Pension Reform Until After 2027 in Bid to Stabilize Government
Orange, Bouygues and Free Make €17 Billion Bid for Drahi’s Altice France Telecom Assets
Dutch Government Seizes Chipmaker After U.S. Presses for Removal of Chinese CEO
Bessent Accuses China of Dragging Down Global Economy Amid New Trade Curbs
U.S. Revokes Visas of Foreign Nationals Who ‘Celebrated’ Charlie Kirk’s Assassination
AI and Cybersecurity at Forefront as GITEX Global 2025 Kicks Off in Dubai
DJI Loses Appeal to Remove Pentagon’s ‘Chinese Military Company’ Label
EU Deploys New Biometric Entry/Exit System: What Non-EU Travelers Must Know
Australian Prime Minister’s Private Number Exposed Through AI Contact Scraper
Ex-Microsoft Engineer Confirms Famous Windows XP Key Was Leaked Corporate License, Not a Hack
China’s lesson for the US: it takes more than chips to win the AI race
Australia Faces Demographic Risk as Fertility Falls to Record Low
California County Reinstates Mask Mandate in Health Facilities as Respiratory Illness Risk Rises
Israel and Hamas Agree to First Phase of Trump-Brokered Gaza Truce, Hostages to Be Freed
French Political Turmoil Elevates Marine Le Pen as Rassemblement National Poised for Power
China Unveils Sweeping Rare Earth Export Controls to Shield ‘National Security’
The Davos Set in Decline: Why the World Economic Forum’s Power Must Be Challenged
France: Less Than a Month After His Appointment, the New French Prime Minister Resigns
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán stated that Hungary will not adopt the euro because the European Union is falling apart.
Sarah Mullally Becomes First Woman Appointed Archbishop of Canterbury
Mayor in western Germany in intensive care after stabbing
Australian government pays Deloitte nearly half a million dollars for a report built on fabricated quotes, fake citations, and AI-generated nonsense.
US Prosecutors Gained Legal Approval to Hack Telegram Servers
Macron Faces Intensifying Pressure to Resign or Trigger New Elections Amid France’s Political Turmoil
Standard Chartered Names Roberto Hoornweg as Sole Head of Corporate & Investment Banking
UK Asylum Housing Firm Faces Backlash Over £187 Million Profits and Poor Living Conditions
UK Police Crack Major Gang in Smuggling of up to 40,000 Stolen Phones to China
BYD’s UK Sales Soar Nearly Nine-Fold, Making Britain Its Biggest Market Outside China
Trump Proposes Farm Bailout from Tariff Revenues Amid Backlash from Other Industries
FIFA Accuses Malaysia of Forging Citizenship Documents, Suspends Seven Footballers
Latvia to Bar Tourist and Occasional Buses to Russia and Belarus Until 2026
×