How a billionaire crypto king built the No. 1 exchange in just 8 months

After a meteoric rise that defied financial orthodoxy, the 41-year-old coder-turned-exchange kingpin is now facing headwinds that threaten to send him back down to Earth

Even in a cryptocurrency industry teeming with overnight success stories, Zhao Changpeng stands out.
 
In less than eight months, the founder of Binance has grown his company from an idea into the world’s largest digital-asset exchange by traded value. He has vaulted from obscurity to the cover of Forbes magazine, steered Binance to a $200 million profit in its second quarter of existence, and amassed a personal fortune that he claims is worth as much as $2 billion.
 
But after a meteoric rise that defied financial orthodoxy (Binance doesn’t have a bank account or a public address), the