Binance pledged to thwart suspicious trading—until it involved a Lamborghini-loving high roller. When the U.S. accused Binance last year of maximizing profits over protecting users, the company promised “unceasing efforts to deliver a safe and trusted platform.”
This was put to the test soon after when an internal investigation found a top client—a firm run by a Lamborghini-loving crypto trader—was manipulating markets.
The result: Binance kept the client and fired its investigator.
The world’s largest digital-currency exchange, born in an unregulated, freewheeling crypto culture, was under the microscope for allegedly failing to prevent the sort of manipulative trading that would get Wall Street traders thrown in jail.
Among the practices the surveillance team found: “VIP” clients—the largest on the exchange—engaged in pump-and-dump schemes and wash trading that were explicitly prohibited in Binance’s own terms of use, according to former company insiders and company documents. Binance also maintained a fleet of secret internal trading accounts that were used to trade large volumes of certain crypto tokens.
Ex-company insiders say the investigator’s dismissal in late 2023 showed that Binance—already in the crosshairs of the Securities and Exchange Commission—neglected evidence of market manipulation and prioritized generating trading fees from large clients over fixing its practices. A fresh boom this year in crypto trading has created lucrative new trading opportunities for both Binance and its high-rolling customers.
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