Canadian crypto mogul turns VC firm into giant family office
Changpeng “CZ” Zhao, a few months out of prison and worth US$70 billion thanks to the relentless crypto rally, is turning the former venture capital arm of his Binance Holdings Ltd. into a family office.
Binance Labs, which oversees about US$10 billion of crypto-related assets, will be renamed YZi Labs, according to a statement on Thursday. Zhao brought back Ella Zhang, who helped set up Binance Labs in 2018 and left two years later, to run the outfit. YZi Labs will also manage the wealth of Binance co-founder Yi He, with whom Zhao has three children.
Zhao, 47, built Binance into the dominant crypto exchange while maintaining that it didn’t have a global headquarters. His approach to compliance didn’t sit well with U.S. authorities, who in 2023 charged Binance and Zhao with failing to prevent cybercriminals and terrorists from trading on the platform. Zhao agreed to pay a US$50 million fine, stepped down as chief executive and was sentenced to four months in custody. He was released in September.
YZi Labs, a play on the Binance co-founders’ names, is now “purely a family office investment vehicle,” Zhang said in an interview.
After publication of this story, YZi Labs issued a statement to Bloomberg News saying it is not a family office, but rather “a venture capital and incubator firm dedicated to fostering innovation and supporting investments across various sectors.” It also said He isn’t involved in YZi Labs’s day-to-day operations.
The firm doesn’t have a formal headquarters as its staff operate remotely, a spokesperson said.
There’s no immediate need for Zhao to inject more money into YZi Labs, Zhang said. His US$69.8 billion fortune is ranked 22nd in the world by the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which estimates it
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