Changpeng Zhao, CEO of top cryptocurrency exchange Binance, recently remarked that he intends to set up Binance headquarters in France. CZ’s comments came during his interview with the French media channel, Les Echos.
During the interview, CZ remarked on the company’s need to comply with regulatory requirements and hopes to be licensed as a digital asset service provider status in France in 2022. CZ said:
“France will be a natural choice for a regional, and even perhaps global, head office. We hope to obtain PSAN (digital asset service providers) approval from the Autorité des marchés financiers within 6 to 12 months, but it all depends on the regulator.”
Binance is currently the world’s largest crypto exchange by market capitalization with over 70% of the crypto exchange transactions to its name. However, the exchange has received harsh warnings from several regulators including those of Japan and Hong Kong. Several countries, including Singapore, Italy, and the UK.
“We started our activity as a decentralized organization but it must be noted that this is not very well received by the regulators. However, this industry must be regulated. We are therefore in the process of setting up headquarters at several levels: local, regional and global,” CZ said in the interview.
CZ comments came following the exchange’s 100 million EUR project ‘Objective Moon‘ with France Fintech, a non-profit organization, to support the development of blockchain and digital assets ecosystems across France and Europe.