SEC Investigate US Binance, Why Again?

JAKARTA – The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is rumored to be conducting an investigation into US Binance, which is a branch of the world's largest crypto exchange, Binance. This was informed by the Wall Street Journal.

Two trading companies in the US, Merit Peak Ltd and Sigma Chain AG, are reportedly linked to Binance founder Changpeng Zhao. The two companies are also under investigation. The SEC is also working to explore how the two could have ties to US Binance.

However, at the end of 2021, Zhao had led the two companies. Therefore, the SEC requires trading platforms to disclose the names of affiliated market makers as reported by U.Today.

The reason is, these names are considered to be able to get an unfair advantage over other traders because they can trade in a more efficient way. For information, Binance AS was launched in September 2019 and was subject to problems, and was summoned by the SEC the following year.

The SEC only wants to know whether the subsidiary actually operates independently of the main exchange or not. Meanwhile, the Coinbase competitor went public in April 2021. Binance US denied that it had any market makers or affiliated market makers in a statement submitted to the Wall Street Journal.