Bulletins

Binance.US reportedly close to new funding from 'top-level' investors

The crypto exchange's U.S. arm has suffered from high-level turnover this year.

Binance phone app

Binance.US has seen considerable turnover at the top.

Photo: Jakub Porzycki/NurPhoto via Getty Images

Binance.US is reportedly close to securing new funding from key investors, in a boost to the beleaguered crypto marketplace.

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao told Bloomberg that there has been "significant interest from top-level investors" and that the company's U.S. affiliate will soon have "a diverse cap table with reputable investors and an independent board with proper governance."

The news follows a series of setbacks for the world's biggest crypto marketplace, led by the departure of Brian Brooks, who resigned after just three months, citing "differences over strategic direction." Chief Financial Officer Joshua Sroge has taken over as interim CEO.

That change highlighted what has been a chaotic year for Binance.US. Brooks, who had served as acting comptroller in the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and a director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, was named CEO in May after the abrupt departure of Catherine Coley, who many believe was fired.

In an added twist, Coley, who had been known for being active on social media platforms like Twitter, suddenly stopped posting on her accounts after she stepped down. (She has liked a handful of tweets, suggesting she's not completely offline.) Coley faces an ongoing lawsuit related to her previous role at Ripple, according to filings in San Francisco Superior Court.

Binance is also reeling from this week's report that crypto investors are seeking damages claiming a Binance outage cost them millions. Binance has recently also been banned from any regulated activity in the U.K. by the Financial Conduct Authority. Regulators have also barred the company from operating in Japan, Canada and Italy.

 Benjamin Pimentel

Benjamin Pimentel ( @benpimentel) covers crypto and fintech from San Francisco. He has reported on many of the biggest tech stories over the past 20 years for the San Francisco Chronicle, Dow Jones MarketWatch and Business Insider, from the dot-com crash, the rise of cloud computing, social networking and AI to the impact of the Great Recession and the COVID crisis on Silicon Valley and beyond. He can be reached at bpimentel@protocol.com or via Google Voice at (925) 307-9342.

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