Changpeng Zhao - Success Story of the Binance Founder

Changpeng Zhao is the founder of the world’s largest crypto exchange Binance. He has turned out to be a true inspiration to many since the company’s inception in 2017. In a span of a few months, Zhao turned the company into the largest exchange platform for the crypto trade. Changpeng Zhao, popularly known as CZ, was valued as the 11th richest person in the world. Recent estimates revealed that his net worth is around $96 billion.

From selling his apartment to buy cryptocurrencies to turning out to be one of the richest people in the world, the life of CZ is something inspiring and exciting to learn about. Let us see where and how Changpeng Zhao's journey started, his early living and his life as the CEO of Binance.

Changpeng Zhao - Personal Life

Changpeng Zhao is a Chinese-Canadian business person who was born in Jiangsu province of China on 10th September 1977. Both of his parents were teachers. Zhao’s father was working as a professor in a university and he was exiled after getting labeled as “pro-bourgeois intellect”. As a result, the family moved to Vancouver, Canada by the late 1980s. During his teenage years in Canada, Zaho started working part-time to support his family’s expenses. He used to work at McDonald’s and a few gas stations after his school.

Changpeng Zhao - Initial Career

Changpeng Zhao was a computer science graduate from McGill University, Montreal. After graduation, he started his career as an intern in Tokyo. He worked for a trader on Tokyo Stock Exchange, who asked Zhao to develop software for matching orders in the stock trade. After the initial experience, he joined the Bloomberg Tradebook LLC in 2001 and worked as the head of Futures Development sector for the next 4 years.

Changpeng Zhao - Professions in the Crypto World

By 2013, Changpeng Zhao joined as the head of the development team in Blockchain. Blockchain.com is a company that provides various cryptocurrency-related services. It created a cryptocurrency wallet that has dealt with almost 28% of the bitcoin transactions between 2011 and 2020. Zhao worked in this company for developing software related to crypto wallets.

Changpeng Zhao - Journey as Binance CEO

Changpeng Zhao’s interest in cryptocurrencies started as early as 2014 while he was playing a poker game with his friend. During that time he got to know about Bitcoin and started investing in it. He even sold his house to buy Bitcoins. Such was his interest in the crypto market. Zhao added experience to his interest by working in various companies.

Changpeng Zhao - Challenges Faced

In fact, in 2019, there was a huge theft of bitcoins from Binance whose value stood around $40 million. Zhao faced all these challenges explicitly including the bitcoin theft. He made sure that the company makes up for all the losses and never let his customers down.

Conclusion

The story of Changpeng Zhao is truly inspiring. Everything we think as impossible was made possible by him. Cryptocurrencies and their market are just getting popular and most people are less knowledgeable or still unaware about it. In such a situation CZ created his own pathway and set a benchmark for aspiring leaders. Zhao created a belief that it is possible to start a business and make it the world’s largest in 5 years.