Binance Founder Changpeng Zhao Questions Lack of Announced Charges at Bank of America

Binance founder Changpeng Zhao questioned the lack of announced criminal charges against Bank of America executives after U.S. agencies announced enforcement actions totaling more than $1.21 billion, contrasting them with his own prison sentence.

On Oct. 14, Zhao wrote on X, “No one was even charged.” He also called the matter “water under the bridge” and urged people to move on.

The actions announced Oct. 13 included civil penalties against the bank and a separate sanctions settlement. The Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) assessed a $1.2 billion civil penalty. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) imposed a $750 million penalty, the largest in its history. FinCEN credited the OCC penalty against its assessment, leaving $450 million due to FinCEN. Bank of America separately agreed to pay $11,662,930 to the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) to settle potential civil liability for 475 apparent sanctions violations. The FinCEN assessment and OFAC settlement together totaled more than $1.21 billion.

Bank of America admitted in a civil consent order that it willfully violated the Bank Secrecy Act. It failed to maintain an adequate anti-money laundering program, conduct required due diligence on certain foreign correspondent accounts and file suspicious activity reports on time. More than $5 billion in suspicious transactions were reported late, including more than $1 billion involving national security and other priority illicit-finance risks. The consent order requires a third-party review to identify suspicious transactions the bank missed and independent reviews of parts of its compliance program.

The OCC said the bank’s transaction surveillance missed activity across trillions of dollars and that problems persisted after a December 2024 cease-and-desist order.

Zhao pleaded guilty Nov. 21, 2023, to violating the Bank Secrecy Act by causing Binance to fail to implement an effective anti-money laundering program. Binance separately pleaded guilty to federal offenses and agreed to pay $4.3 billion in penalties. Zhao was sentenced April 30, 2024, to four months in prison and a $50 million fine. President Donald Trump pardoned him Oct. 21, 2025.

The Bank of America actions did not announce criminal charges against an individual executive. They were civil enforcement actions against the bank, while Zhao’s case included an individual criminal guilty plea.