Binance Was Used to Funnel Money to Hamas, Other Militant Groups

Binance compliance chief acknowledged Hamas funding in 2019
Exchange ‘enabled a range of illicit actors,’ Treasury said

US Attorney General Merrick Garland says Binance Holdings Ltd. and its Chief Executive Officer Changpeng Zhao chose not to comply with US law because doing so would cut into their profits. Zhao, who agreed to step down and pay a $50 million fine as part of the settlement, appeared in court in Seattle Tuesday to plead guilty. Garland speaks in Washington.Source: Bloomberg

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By Allyson Versprille

November 21, 2023 at 8:36 PM UTC

Updated on

November 21, 2023 at 10:01 PM UTC

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In February 2019, Binance Holdings Ltd.’s then-Chief Compliance Officer Samuel Lim acknowledged that the cryptocurrency exchange was being used to funnel money to Hamas, explaining to a colleague that terrorists normally sent “small sums.”

Hamas could “barely buy an AK47 with 600 bucks,” the colleague responded in a chat message, according to the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s March lawsuit against the world’s largest crypto exchange.