The Journal. - Trump Family Has Explored Deal with Binance

Episode Date: March 13, 2025

In 2023, crypto exchange Binance and its CEO and founder, Changpeng Zhao, pleaded guilty to violating U.S. money laundering laws. Now, an investigation finds that representatives of President Trump’s family have been in talks to take a financial stake in the U.S. arm of Binance. At the same time, Zhao has pushed the Trump administration to grant him a pardon. WSJ’S Rebecca Ballhaus brings exclusive reporting.  Further Reading: - Trump Family Has Held Deal Talks With Binance Following Crypto Exchange’s Guilty Plea  - How the Trumps Turned an Election Victory Into a Cash Bonanza    Further Listening: - Love Trump? Now You Can Buy His Meme Coin  - Inside the Trump Crypto Bromance  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

President Trump has made crypto a big part of his agenda. He's even called himself the crypto president. planet and we're taking historic action to deliver on that promise as you know. And today, the Wall Street Journal came out with a big scoop on a potential deal between the Trump family and a crypto giant. Our reporting shows that representatives of Trump's family have held talks to take a financial stake in the US arm of Binance, which is a crypto exchange that in 2023 pleaded guilty and paid a pretty massive fine after it was accused of violating anti-money laundering requirements. That's investigative reporter Rebecca Bauhaus.

And according to Rebecca's reporting, not only is the Trump family in talks about a stake in Binance, but the founder of Binance, a convicted felon, is also asking for a presidential pardon. And so the fact of someone, you know, pushing for an official government action from the president at the same time as a company is in talks with the president's family or representatives of the president's family is just a pretty striking mixture

between official and personal business. In an ordinary administration, the family of a president pursuing a business deal like this, particularly in an industry that the president is actively making rules for and sort of doing things that the industry has long wanted, would in any ordinary administration be the enormous scandal.

In this administration, I would say, you know, the Trump organization has been pretty upfront about the fact that they're not gonna stop pursuing business deals. But I think the really shocking thing is just this sort of idea of pursuing a business deal as a pardon is also being sought. It certainly creates the appearance of a conflict, even if it's not an exchange of one for the other. Welcome to The Journal, our show about money, business and power. I'm Kate Leinbach. It's Thursday, March 13th.

Coming up on the show, the Trump family, a possible crypto deal, and maybe even a presidential pardon. Today stands for Total Fund Savings Adventure. Maybe reach out to TD Direct Investing. Hey, it's DJ First Dibs. I noticed you've been listening to a lot of summer vibes lately. I get it. You're dreaming about vacations. Ooh, baby, that's my jam. With Sunwing's First Dibs on summer savings, let us curate something stronger than what you've been listening to.

Because while your playlist screams, I need a vacation. My algorithm suggests book before March 30th. Remember Sunwing, save more, do more. Book with your local travel advisor or at sunwing.ca. What is Binance and who founded it? Binance is a crypto exchange that for years was sort of one of the major exchanges. It was founded by Chengpeng Zhao, CZ as he's known, in 2017 in Shanghai. And for years, it was really sort of on the rise, growing incredibly quickly, and was really one of the main competitors in this space. As it grew, finance came under scrutiny from federal regulators. In response, CZ set up

a separate U.S. exchange for American clients to try to allay the regulatory concerns. But then in 2023, Binance reached a deal with the Justice Department over a sweeping criminal investigation. We do have some breaking news on a major crypto company, Binance. The CEO, Chang Peng Zhao, is pleading guilty to federal charges. Including the use of cryptocurrency exchanges to support groups such as Hamas. Binance founder CZ sentenced to four months in prison.

The Department of Justice says that his company, Binance, failed to prevent money laundering. Binance agreed to settle the investigation and to pay a $4.3 billion fine. And its founder, CZ? So as part of the settlement, Zao stepped down as CEO, but he remained the majority shareholder. And last year he was sentenced to four months in prison. He was released in September and he's now living in Abu Dhabi.

He was released in September and he's now living in Abu Dhabi. In 2023, the crypto industry was in hard times. Popular exchange FTX had collapsed and its owner, Sam Bankman Fried, was convicted of fraud. Federal investigators were cracking down on crypto companies. But now, in 2025, crypto is on an upswing. A few months ago, Bitcoin hit an all-time high of $100,000. Many investors point to Trump's reelection as a good sign for the industry.

But Binance is currently missing out. When did Binance start thinking it could potentially reenter the US market? So our understanding is that around the time of Trump's election win last fall, Binance began exploring its options for how to return to the US market. It began telling people that it was willing

to make a deal with Trump's company and that it wanted to eliminate its legal problems in the U.S. And our understanding is that around that time, it began reaching out to allies of Trump, sort of offering to strike a business deal with the family as part of this plan to return the company to the U.S. Was there a playbook they were following? Like, how did they come up with an idea of what to do? So our understanding is that they got a pretty good idea for a playbook when they saw what

happened in November with Justin Sun, according to a person familiar with the discussions. In November, Justin Sun, who is a China-born crypto entrepreneur who is facing charges from the SEC, invested $30 million in World Liberty Financial, which is a crypto company that is backed by the Trump family and was launched a couple of months before the election. And for Sun, we saw that last month, the SEC asked a court to pause its fraud case against him. And so it remains to be seen how that will shake out once that 60-day pause is over. And when Binance saw that Sun had made this investment, they thought that could be a route for us to go here.

And so they began considering making a deal with World Liberty Financial or potentially sort of going the same route of a cash infusion in the company in exchange for a pardon for the founder. So what do finance executives do? So we know that sometime after they internally discussed whether they should go this Justin Sun route of investing in World Liberty Financial,

these talks about a business deal continue. And at some point here, Steve Whitkoff, who's a longtime friend of Trump, who also co-founded World Liberty Financial, gets involved in these talks. Whitkoff is a real estate investor, a lawyer, and is also Trump's top negotiator in the Middle East and for the war in Ukraine. An administration official denied Witkoff's involvement

and said he's in the process of divesting from his business interests. World Liberty Financial declined to comment. World Liberty Financial declined to comment. We don't know the exact TikTok of how these talks unfolded and when each person got involved, but we do know that they've continued even since Trump's inauguration, as well as the push for a pardon for CZ. The reason that CZ is seeking a pardon, given that he's already served his prison sentence and has been released, is that Binance has wanted for at least several months now to return to the US market.

And a pardon would really help him clear the way to do that. The other thing a pardon could help with is that it complicates Binance's business in the European Union to have a majority shareholder be a convicted felon. And so were he to be pardoned, it could also sort of ease some hurdles abroad as well. Why would this kind of deal be appealing to the Trump family? So it's a great question because you have to think that, you know, this kind of deal, if it became public, would bring a lot of scrutiny that the Trump family and World Liberty Financial might not be interested in.

At the same time, I think if they did go forward with a stake in this American arm of Binance, and if the Trump family or World Liberty Financial were to have a stake in that, its value is likely to really increase after returning to the U.S. market. And so for them, it would mean sort of a piece of this pie that is expected to grow if they return to the U.S. The Trump Organization and Binance didn't respond to requests for comment.

Binance U.S to requests for comment. Binance US declined to comment. In a tweet today, CZ said he had not had discussions about this potential deal, adding, quote, no felon would mind a pardon. How common is this kind of business deal for a president, but also in the Trump universe? Well, you know, it's not unusual for the Trump organization to pursue deals, including foreign deals.

They've been pretty open about that. But what is unusual is, you know, pursuing a deal with a company, first of all, that was convicted of a crime, you know, just over a year ago, but also one whose founder is actively asking for something from the administration. It certainly fits with a pattern of the Trump family or representatives of the Trump family pursuing a number of different business ventures while Trump has been in office. Coming up, it's not just Binance.

How Trump's family has turned his presidency into a cash Bonanza. At Enterprise, we know you're constantly on the move. Getting this, Thanks, Mom. Fixing that. You reach a destination. And then it's on to the next. And when life is moving at the speed of, well, life, Enterprise is right there with you. Around the corner and around the globe.

We'll keep you moving forward. Enterprise. Her lives in drive. Since Trump was elected, what has the Trump family's financial picture looked like? I would say that since the election, there has been a cash bonanza for the Trump family's financial picture looked like? I would say that since the election, there has been a cash bonanza for the Trump family. So we saw this really sort of ramp up during the transition when Amazon had done a $40 million deal

to buy a documentary about Melania Trump's return to the White House. And this was a pretty shocking number because it was the most Amazon had ever paid for a documentary. And as we reported last month, it was also three times what the next highest bidder had offered for the documentary. So that was one.

The second is that Trump has been pressing the companies that he sued while he was out of office to now settle their lawsuits that he had brought against them. And he's been pretty successful. We've seen a handful of major settlements that total, I think about, were at $50 million so far, much of which is going to Trump's presidential library. Those settlements have been with companies

including ABC News, X, and Metta. Trump's other big financial windfall? Meme coins. Earlier this year, he launched one name for himself, and the first lady launched her own too. And then we've seen this meme coin that Trump launched in the days before his inauguration that has already collected hundreds of millions of dollars in trading and other fees that go to entities affiliated with Trump.

What has Trump said about these meme coins? So one thing we heard was that just a couple of weeks ago at Mar-a-Lago at a private fundraiser for donors who had paid a billion dollars to be there, he was kind of marveling at the ability of a coin like that to bring in potentially billions of dollars. And he actually went around the audience and asked whether they knew what his coin was worth.

And the answer he got was that the total market cap at the time was about $13 billion. But so, you know, it's clear that Trump is paying attention to these things. Trump didn't always pay attention to crypto. Just a few years ago, he said it was a disaster waiting to happen. And then we really saw him sharply turn during the campaign

and especially in 2024, towards the industry and started calling himself the crypto president. But I think there were a couple of factors at play. The first is that I think he saw the potential for fundraising from that industry. We know that between his election and his inauguration, he brought in something like $50 million from the industry for his inaugural fund and other committees. And I think he likes the idea of sort of returning the crypto industry to the U.S. and making the U.S., as he has said, the crypto capital of the world. Trump's administration has rolled back some regulatory threats to the crypto industry.

He signed executive orders regarding crypto, hosted crypto leaders at the White House. And last week, Trump established a strategic Bitcoin reserve. And then the SEC, which Trump doesn't directly control, but he certainly appointed regulators who are friendly to the crypto industry. We've seen them drop or pause a dozen lawsuits against crypto companies so far. So, you know, he'd be getting a stake in a crypto company at a time where crypto is thriving in the US. And this cash bonanza that we're talking about, the deals from the Melania documentary to the settlements to the meme coins.

Have these raised any concerns or criticism? Yes, I think it is safe to say that there has been a lot of criticism of his avid pursuit of business deals while in office. But you know, I think it's also worth noting that the people in the government who would really be in a position to try and do something about this, for example, the head of the Office of Government Ethics, Trump fired soon after becoming president, and he's installed a close ally of his in that job. So the number of people within the federal government, or at least within the executive branch, who have the standing to kind of speak out

about some of these conflicts, there's a pretty small number of those. During Trump's first administration, conflicts of interest were a big concern. How differently are he and his family operating now in the second term? So you're right that it was a big issue the first time around. But I would say that this administration is so far the first term kind of on steroids when it comes to this stuff.

I thought one thing that was really striking was Eric Trump in October, the month before the election, said in an interview with the Journal that sort of the first time around, they tried to do everything right, and he felt they got very little credit for it. And the implication was, you know, we're not going to try and necessarily abide by these norms this time around. And are there some guardrails that the White House has put in place? I mean, I think it's important to note that the president is just not bound by the same conflict of interest rules as the rest of the federal government is.

He doesn't have to abide by these laws that dictate that you have to avoid participating in something that you have a personal stake in. I didn't realize that. Yeah, the president does not have the same requirements of what they have to avoid in terms of conflict. But most presidents other than Trump have sort of taken that very seriously. Nonetheless, they typically place their assets in a blind trust. They avoid striking new deals while in office, but Trump instead has transferred

his assets to the control of his children who have continued to pursue these deals. So looking at this potential deal with Binance, is it any different from the other deals that have happened in the Trump orbit? I mean, a number of these deals so far have the potential to have an overlap with the administration's work. You know, these, a settlement with Metta, which is, you know, actively seeking a lot from this administration

and whose CEO is meeting with Trump in the White House, there is certainly the potential for overlap there or the expectation of overlap there. I think this just sort of takes it one step further where you're pursuing a business deal with a convicted business venture, convicted business venture with a founder who has pleaded guilty just a little over a year ago, who at the same time is looking for a pardon

for those charges. I just think that that's sort of the most acute intertwining of these things that we've seen so far. That's all for today, Thursday, March 13th. The Journal is a co-production of Spotify and The Wall Street Journal. Additional reporting in this episode by Angus Berwick, Josh Dawsey, Patricia Kausman, Annie Linsky, Dana Mattioli, and Caitlin Ostrov. Thanks for listening. See you tomorrow.