U.S. authorities initiate probe into Binance, Bloomberg reports

The U.S. Department of Justice and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) are conducting a probe into the cryptocurrency exchange Binance, Bloomberg reports, citing unnamed sources.

According to the report, authorities are examining the trading platform for potential violations of anti-money-laundering and tax laws. Sources said that representatives of the DOJ and the IRS are requesting information “from people familiar with Binance’s business”.

At this stage, the exchange has not been accused of violations, and the case may not progress further.

A Binance spokesman told ForkLog that the company adopts a collaborative approach to working with regulators worldwide and “takes its legal obligations very seriously.” The exchange issued a similar statement in response to Bloomberg’s report.

We take our legal obligations very seriously and engage with regulators and law enforcement in a collaborative fashion. (1/3) https://t.co/68UB1InOBK

— Binance (@binance) May 13, 2021

Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao called the publication’s \”bad\” headline. He said it described how the exchange cooperates with law enforcement agencies \”in the fight against bad actors.\”

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

In the last 24 hours, the Binance Coin token fell 5.5%, according to CoinGecko. At the time of writing, the coin trades at around $591.

In March 2021, Bloomberg reported that an investigation had started into Binance. Later the company’s chief legal officer Max Bokus stated that there were no charges by the agency.

In the same month, the exchange hired former FATF officials as advisers on regulatory compliance and oversight.

In April, former head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency within the U.S. Treasury, Brian Brooks headed the company’s U.S. subsidiary.

Earlier, European regulators began examining Binance’s compliance with transparency and disclosure rules in connection with the launch of trading in tokenised shares.