The Weekly Grind (Sep 22–Sep 28): SEC Down to Two, $351M Bitget Hack
SEC's Peirce exits, Bitget loses $351M, and Robinhood memecoins scam $18.4M.
SEC's Peirce exits, Bitget loses $351M, and Robinhood memecoins scam $18.4M.
Binance bought 1,237,011 Circle shares at $80.84 each in a private placement that closed September 17, two days after Manhattan prosecutors filed to seize Iranian oil money that ran through Binance accounts. Circle disclosed it on September 22, the same day Bloomberg reported Binance is under federal investigation for Iran sanctions violations. The deal comes with a new five-year agreement where Circle pays Binance a monthly fee based on USDC balances. Here is how the money moves in both directions, and what the 8-K says about getting out.
Bloomberg reports the Manhattan US Attorney's office, with DOJ's Criminal Division, is investigating whether Binance knowingly let trading that violated Iran sanctions continue on its platform. It lands seven days after the same office filed to forfeit $61 million in Iranian oil proceeds laundered through Binance accounts, and seven months after the Wall Street Journal reported Binance's own compliance team flagged $1.7 billion flowing from Chinese clients to Iran-linked wallets. Binance already pleaded guilty and paid $4.3 billion for this exact category of failure in 2023. Its founder was pardoned in October. Here is what a second case would mean.
Starting July 1, Binance suspends trading, deposits, and new sign-ups for millions of EU users across 27 countries after failing to secure a MiCA license. The root cause: Changpeng Zhao's 2023 U.S. guilty plea.
Crypto chaos: North Korea's $6.75B crypto heist, $580M liquidations, Binance's EU ban looms.
Christine Lagarde allegedly pressured Greece to block Binance's MiCA application. The motive? Analysts say the ECB is protecting its digital euro from crypto's biggest exchange.
Greece's regulator is set to reject Binance's MiCA license application — and without an EU passport by July 1, the world's largest crypto exchange faces an existential shutdown across all 27 EU member states.
CZ praised Hyperliquid's no-KYC trading model and said he'd 'never' run a platform like it. Then OKX's founder revealed CZ has been quietly backing Aster DEX — a Hyperliquid clone built without KYC.
Binance just launched Pre-IPO Perpetual Contracts, letting anyone on earth speculate on SpaceX's valuation before it goes public. Wall Street just got disintermediated.