Short answers, pulled from the story.
Changpeng Zhao founded Binance in 2017 within the borders of China. The company moved its servers and headquarters out of China just before the Chinese government banned cryptocurrency trading in September 2017.
The US Department of Justice convicted Binance on multiple charges including violations of the Bank Secrecy Act on the 27th of November 2023. As part of the plea deal, the company agreed to pay $4 billion in fines for violating money laundering laws.
Reuters found that Binance had acted as a conduit for the laundering of at least $2.35 billion from hacks. The report also found that $780 million was laundered from the Russian darknet market Hydra.
Binance announced it would discontinue support for BUSD in a formal statement issued on the 1st of September 2023. This decision followed an order from the New York Department of Financial Services to stop minting new BUSD tokens in February 2023.
On the 23rd of October 2025, Trump pardoned Zhao with White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying he had been the victim of persecution by the Joe Biden administration. Zhao paid lobbyists $800,000 to lobby for a pardon from Trump for his conviction.