Formally ending one of the last remaining crypto enforcement cases taken by the agency, the SEC has abandoned its complaint against Binance and founder Changpeng Zhao.
Originally brought in June 2023, lawyers for the SEC and Binance jointly moved to dismiss the matter in a Thursday filing in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
Originally complaining about infractions including illegally supplying U.S. consumers, exaggerating trading volumes, and mixing customer funds, the crypto exchange was charged Argument also used against Coinbase, Kraken, and others under previous SEC leadership: the agency argued Binance illegally permitted trading in crypto assets it considered to be unregistered securities.
The firing puts a symbolic end to one of the most serious crypto crackdowns in U.S. history and comes as the Trump government works hard to establish that it is an ally of the sector. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission will now be run under the direction of a venture capitalist closely associated with cryptocurrencies; the Justice Department has already dissolved its crypto enforcement squad.
By volume, Binance is the biggest digital assets exchange available worldwide. It lately developed relationships with World Liberty Financial, a business aiming to establish a crypto bank and distributes 75% of earnings to companies connected to the Trump family. Binance is investing $2 billion from the Emirati state fund MGX solely in USD1, a stablecoin just introduced by the World Liberty team.
Where WLF co-founder Zack Witkoff, the son of U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, recently negotiated a contract with the government, Binance and World Liberty are also making increasing presence in Pakistan. Zhao was hired at around the same time as an adviser to Pakistan’s newly established Crypto Council, a state-owned entity charged with creating national digital asset policy.
Important regulations that formerly kept Wall Street on the sidelines have also been started to be undermined by the SEC. Staff Accounting Bulletin 121, a divisive guideline issued under former Chair Gary Gensler mandating banks to list crypto holdings as liabilities on their balance sheets, was deleted in January Celebrating the reversal on X, Peirce posted, “Bye, bye SAB 121! It hasn’t been entertaining.
The Trump family benefited when the government followed up with further advice in February stating that most meme coins are not recognized as securities under federal law.
Closely linked to cryptocurrency endeavors, notably the $Trump token, which debuted just before his January inauguration, are President Trump and numerous of his family members. With its website claiming that the Trump Organization and related companies hold 80% of the supply, the coin now boasts a market cap of over $2.4 billion.
