Changpeng Zhao, the former chief executive of Binance, was sentenced on Tuesday to four months in prison after pleading guilty  to violating U.S. laws against money laundering at the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.

Zhao, who went by the nickname CZ, has also satisfied the requirement of him to pay $50 million in fines, U.S. District Judge Richard Jones said in court Tuesday.

The judge also won’t impose five months of probation as was recommended by the probation officer, Mail Online reports.

The 47-year-old admitted to violating the Bank Secrecy Act by willfully failing to set up an effective anti-money laundering system at Binance, the cryptocurrency exchange he founded and ran as CEO from July 2017 to November 2023.

Binance also pleaded guilty to similar charges from the US Department of Justice in November 2023 and was forced to pay $4.3 billion in fines and restitution for failing to register as a money transmitting business, Forbes reported.

U.S. prosecutors had urged the court to sentence Zhao to three years in prison after he pleaded guilty to violating laws against money laundering.

They argued that sentencing Zhao to twice the maximum 18 months recommended under federal guidelines would reflect the magnitude of his willful violations, and send a message that would deter others.

A U.S. district court had in March ordered that Zhao must surrender his Canadian passport and notify the court before travelling within the country.

This came after U.S. District Judge, Honorable Richard A. Jones restricted his bond conditions.

The court ordered the businessman to surrender all valid and expired passports, and the documents were to be transferred to someone to be hired by his lawyers who would accompany the Binance founder on all trips where a passport might be needed.

He must also notify the relevant authorities of his movements.

In the case between the U.S. and Zhao as the defendant, the court ruling of March 11, 2024, obtained by SaharaReporters, is as follows: “Defendant must remain in the continental United States through the imposition of sentence.

“Defendant must notify Pretrial Services before any travel within the continental United States.

“Defendant must surrender his current Canadian passport to a third-party custodian employed and supervised by his counsel of record.

“The third-party custodian must retain control over that Canadian passport and must accompany Defendant on any travel that requires identification documents.

“Defendant must surrender all other current and expired passports and travel documents to his counsel of record, who may return those documents to defendant only with authorization from Pretrial Services or the Court.

“Defendant may not apply for or obtain a new passport or travel document from any country without the Court’s permission.”

In November 2023, Zhao pleaded guilty to criminal charges and violating the Bank Secrecy Act. He subsequently agreed to pay a fine and stepped down as the company’s CEO.

Zhao was released on bail of $175 million.

This was part of a $4.3 billion settlement with the Department of Justice, according to court documents.

The plea arrangement with the government followed years of investigation into the dealings of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange.

In December, Judge Jones barred Zhao from leaving the U.S. pending a verdict in his case.

In February, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Olayemi Cardoso, said $26 billion passed through Binance Nigeria from unknown sources and users in one year.

The allegation came amid the free fall of the naira and clampdown on Bureaux de Change by President Bola Tinubu’s administration in an attempt to steady the rapid decline of Nigeria’s currency, naira.

Cardoso said the government was “concerned that certain practices go on that indicate illicit flows going through a number of these entities, and suspicious flows at best”.

The Nigerian government later arrested two Binance executives for alleged money laundering – Tigran Gambaryan, a U.S. citizen and Binance’s head of financial crime compliance, and Nadeem Anjarwalla, a British-Kenyan who is African regional manager for the cryptocurrency trading firm.

Anjarwalla later escaped from detention and fled to Kenya. Meanwhile, their trial has commenced in a Federal High Court in Abuja.

• Stephen Grimason died following a long battle with cancer
• He left the BBC to become Stormont’s director of communications until 2016

The veteran BBC journalist Stephen Grimason who broke news of the historic  Good Friday Agreement in April 1998 has died aged 67.

The former BBC Northern Ireland political editor passed away following a long-term battle with cancer.

Following his iconic three-decade-long career in journalism, Grimason, originally from Lurgan, Co Armagh, later went on to work for the Stormont administration as director of communications.

He spoke publicly over the last year about his fight against cancer and said he received well wishes from former Prime Minister Tony Blair among others.

In an interview in January when he, along with former UTV political editor Ken Reid, was honoured with the Chancellor’s Medal for services to journalism, he described leaving it as ‘a bit of a wrench’, recalling ‘being surrounded by tremendous people’.

• The icon is widely remembered for breaking the news of the Good Friday Agreement in April 1998 and reporting on The Troubles

Looking back, he said he had a ‘seat at the table for an awful lot of pretty dramatic Executive meetings’ in the 2000s.

Grimason cut his teeth working in local newspapers including the Lurgan Mail, the Ulster Star in Lisburn and Banbridge Chronicle, as well as regional papers, the former Sunday News newspapers and the News Letter.

At just 27-years-old, Grimason had become the editor of the Banbridge Chronicle.

Later, after 12 years in newspaper journalism, he applied for a job at the BBC in Northern Ireland.

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‘There were something like 300 of us (who applied) and two of us got jobs – so I must have bluffed my way rightly,’ he said of that time.

SEE ALSO:  Binance crypto founder Zhao sentenced to four months in prison

Speaking in January at Queen’s University around the then political stalemate, Grimason noted the ‘tide of Irish and Northern Irish politics goes in and out’, adding: ‘If you’re not careful and you don’t lead, you’ll be left on the beach.’

He also spoke of covering some of the darkest days of the Troubles, including atrocities within days in January 1992 – an IRA bomb which killed eight construction workers at Teebane, Co Tyrone, and the killing of five people by loyalists at the Sean Graham bookmakers on the Ormeau Road in Belfast.

‘I was the first reporter at Teebane. In the end, I think that the big success of the peace process was that actually peace, or an imperfect version of it, did win through,’ he said.

When Grimason memorably broke the news of the peace deal which helped end the troubles, he declared on television: ‘I have it in my hand’.

• Stephen Grimason, who was the BBC NI political editor in 1998, re-enacts the moment he broke the news to the TV audience that the Good Friday Agreement was across the line

• Former UTV political editor Ken Reid (left) and former BBC Northern Ireland political editor Stephen Grimason (right) at the Queen’s University in Belfast where they were honoured with the Chancellor’s Medal for services to journalism

• Ken Reid (left) and Stephen Grimason (right) at Queen’s University in Belfast

Grimason was described as a ‘brilliant political editor’ by former Northern Ireland presenter Noel Thompson, BBC reported.

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‘He had the two most important attributes for the job. He loved the gossip – the inside track – and he loved to share it with the rest of us,’ he said.

‘His biggest scoop was of course getting hold of a copy of the Good Friday Agreement before any of the hundreds of other journalists camped out at Stormont.

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”I have it in my hand’ he told me live on air, with justifiable pride and excitement. It’s one of the key journalistic moments of the last 30 or 40 years.’

Grimason left the BBC to become Stormont’s new director of communications, a role he held until 2016.

He suffered heartache in 2022, when his younger brother Darryl, who was also a BBC journalist ad presenter, passed away.

Adam Smyth, director of BBC Northern Ireland, also paid tribute to Grimason following his shock death.

He said: ‘Stephen Grimason possessed the special talents that only the very best editors and correspondents exhibit – the audience always came away from his broadcasts feeling they knew and understood the political landscape better, and they trusted what he had to say.

‘Stephen’s list of contacts and sources was so extensive he regularly seemed to be one step ahead of everyone else – including the politicians.

‘His contribution to BBC Northern Ireland is deeply appreciated and we offer our sincerest condolences to Stephen’s family.’

Ken Reid wrote on X, formerly Twitter: ‘Stephen Grimason, my dear friend, has died.

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‘He showed enormous courage against the odds right to very end. In over 40 years of friendship and rivalry we never exchanged a cross word.

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‘Lucky to have spent time with him in his last days. Sleep well my friend’.

Outside of work, Grimason was reportedly an avid golfer and a keen rugby and football fan, and passionate about Chelsea FC.  (Daily Mail)