Binance Founder CZ Aims to Fix US Crypto Liquidity Gap

Changpeng "CZ" Zhao wants to clear up what he calls "misunderstandings" about his role at Binance. The founder and majority shareholder of both Binance.com and Binance.US said in a CoinDesk interview that he does not run either exchange day-to-day. He does not want to be a CEO or sit on boards beyond Binance.US.

His ownership gives him structural influence. When the conversation turns to Binance.US, CZ describes a specific ambition: break the hold that a few leading exchanges have on U.S. crypto trading and offer lower-cost service.

"We want to do more in the U.S., and personally, I really want to help make the U.S. the capital of crypto," he told CoinDesk.

The mechanism is liquidity. Binance's global exchange holds much deeper order books than any U.S.-only platform can sustain. CZ argues that U.S. consumers pay for that gap through wider spreads and higher slippage.

"U.S. consumers don't have access to the best liquidity," he said. "That means they pay a much higher price to buy and sell crypto."

His fix: let Binance.US tap the global exchange's liquidity pool. U.S. exchanges could try to grow liquidity without offshore markets. 80% of global GDP sits outside the U.S. and other countries are courting crypto business. No guarantee the domestic-only approach will work, he said.

For a trader, this matters. If Binance.US can offer tighter spreads, it could pull volume from Coinbase and Kraken. The catch is regulatory risk. CZ's past – a four-month prison stint after pleading guilty to money laundering violations, later pardoned – means any liquidity-sharing arrangement faces close scrutiny. State and federal regulators may view the global exchange's involvement as a backdoor.

CZ insists the two companies operate independently. "Binance.US has a CEO, Binance.com has two co-CEOs," he said. "They almost never talk to each other." He sits on the Binance.US board but said the role calls for a local leader. "It needs to be somebody on the ground," he said.

That independence extends to his personal life. Yi He, one of Binance's co-CEOs, is his partner. They share a home in the UAE. CZ said they do not discuss Binance at home.

He tracks top-line figures for the exchanges: user count and trading volume. His primary gauge is simpler. "Just the bitcoin price," he said. "If the price is going up, the company is generally doing well."

CZ's ideal role is informal advising. He invests in hundreds of portfolio companies through YZi Labs. Founders can reach him directly for 10-minute calls.

Volume data from May shows combined exchange trading fell 3.45% to $4.41 trillion, the lowest since September 2024. RWA perpetual futures bucked the trend, rising 10.4% to a new all-time high. The divergence points to institutional appetite for tokenized real-world asset derivatives, a market where Binance is a major player.

The interview signals CZ is re-engaging with Washington ahead of the U.S. election cycle. Whether that engagement translates to a Binance.US liquidity partnership depends on regulatory appetite. For now, the largest shareholder is betting the U.S. wants competitive markets more than it wants to block him.