Innocent BenjaminBarely hours after Tesla boss, Elon Musk, sent ripples down the Crypto Sphere by announcing Tesla’s severance with Bitcoin in favour of Doge, another shock wave has been sent, but this time, by government authorities in the world’s most respected territory.
Binance Group, the world’s largest cryptocurrency platform, is under investigation by the US Department of Justice and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) for illicit activities.
The Bloomberg agency reported that “as part of the inquiry, officials who probe money laundering and tax offenses have sought information from individuals with insight into Binance’s business, according to people with knowledge of the matter who asked not to be named because the probe is confidential.”
The investigation does not involve the issuance of a formal accusation against the platform, according to ‘Bloomberg’, but encompasses the search for information on some of its users for indications of money laundering and tax evasion.
Under the leadership of 44-year-old Chinese- Canadian Changpeng Zhao, aka CZ, Binance has become the largest cryptocurrency market, outperforming veterans such as Coinbase and Kraken in trading activity, users, and commissions. This same week, the platform suffered a temporary suspension of its service in which all its users were prevented from reimbursing or withdrawing their assets to other accounts.
Reacting to the Bloomberg report, Zhao himself defended his institution, mildly criticising the publication in a post on Twitter.
“The “news” title is bad. Article itself isn’t so bad actually (but who reads). It described how @binance collaborated with law enforcement agencies to fight bad players, but somehow made it look like a bad thing… ? Anyways. Back to work,” said the billionaire.
The “news” title is bad. Article itself isn’t so bad actually (but who reads). It described how @binance collaborated with law enforcement agencies to fight bad players, but somehow made it look like a bad thing… ? Anyways. Back to work.
— CZ ? Binance (@cz_binance) May 13, 2021
The company, headquartered in the Cayman Islands, has become the benchmark for cryptocurrencies with the inclusion of new token launches, and the trading of others not available on other platforms such as Ripple, which was expelled from Coinbase, as well as the doggy memes Dogecoin and Shiba Inu.
In fact, Binance has its own crypto: the Binance Coin (BNB), which is the third most popular digital asset in the world behind Bitcoin and Ether with a value of 70,000 million euros.
The tech company have long been in the crosshairs of the US authorities due to the “suspicious” flow of operations on its platform linked to criminal activities, according to the firm Chainalysis, one of the specialists used by the federal government to analyze crypto assets.
OFONIMEH JOHNSON
James steller
Mitrobe Staff