Page 63 - Forbes - USA (February 2018)

F I N T E C H

THE CRAZIEST BUBBLE EVER HAS CREATED BILLION-DOLLAR FORTUNES.

MEET THE FREAKS, GEEKS AND MESSIANIC VISIONARIES WHO HAVE
SCORED CRYPTOCURRENCY RICHES.

REPORTED BY PAMELA AMBLER, ANGEL AU-YEUNG, GRACE CHUNG, JEFF KAUFLIN, ALEX KONRAD, LAURA SHIN AND NATHAN VARDI.

n the world of cryptocurrency, where billion-dollar fortunes can be made overnight, speed is everything—
and CZ is the fastest of them all. From closet-size offices in Tokyo—“I would touch four people if I turned

around in a circle”—the 41-year-old Chinese-Canadian coder runs Binance, a cryptocurrency exchange
that has gone from a standing start to the largest on the planet in just under 180 days. CZ (born Changpeng

Zhao) cut his teeth making high-frequency trading systems for Wall Street’s flash boys, and he built Binance
to be a Ferrari. His exchange can process a blazing 1.4 million transactions a second and on a peak trading
I day in January processed 3.5 billion new orders, cancels and trades. Speculators (some 25% of them from
the U.S.) use Binance to trade 120 different coins, generating $200 million in profits for CZ’s exchange last quarter.

BNB, the virtual coin CZ created in August that gives holders a 50% discount on trading fees, has a market cap of $1.3
bil lion. His stake in Binance and his coins give CZ a personal fortune worth as much as $2 billion.
PHOTOGRAPHER JAMEL TOPPIN FOR FORBES
FEBRUARY 28, 2018 FORBES | 61