By creating the Binance exchange, Changpeng “CZ Zhao” quickly established himself as one of the major figures in the cryptocurrency ecosystem. However, despite his colossal fortune and his overloaded schedule, the one nicknamed CZ is considered by many to be a simple, caring and accessible person. A humility that is matched only by its ambition, with a clear objective: to increase monetary freedom via cryptocurrencies.
Before establishing himself as one of the heavyweights of the cryptocurrency ecosystem, and being among the richest personalities in the world, Changpeng Zhao had a turbulent childhood. CZ was born in China on September 10, 1977, in the coastal province of Jiangsu located north of Shanghai. His mother was a primary and secondary school teacher, and his father reconciled his studies with a teaching job, while waiting to obtain his doctorate. Changpeng Zhao therefore spent the first years of his life moving from campus to campus, following the wanderings of his parents.
Marked by this difficult period, he chose to go into exile as soon as he had the opportunity. He was accepted at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, and flew to Canada in 1984 to resume his studies. Between the ages of six and twelve, CZ therefore hardly saw his father.
During his adolescence in Canada, Changpeng Zhao was forced to chain odd jobs to help his parents meet the needs of the family. He notably worked as a night watchman in a gas station, or as a kitchen clerk in a McDonald's restaurant.
Shortly after arriving in Canada, CZ has an encounter that will change his life. When he was 12 or 13, his dad splurged on a DTK Tech-1230c computer, spending a good chunk of the family savings. But with hindsight, it is a good investment, because it was this machine that allowed CZ to begin his love affair with computers.
After graduating from college, CZ worked for four years at Bloomberg Tradebook, where he developed futures trading software for Wall Street. Highly regarded by his peers, he was promoted several times, and led teams in the United States, England and Japan. In 2005, he decided to strike out on his own: he moved to Shanghai where he created his first company, Fusion Systems, which provides some of the fastest high-frequency trading systems for professionals.
In 2017, Changpeng Zhao finds that cryptocurrency exchanges still suffer from many flaws: they are slow, provide poor user experience, crash with every bitcoin rise, and provide no customer support.
In July 2017, Changpeng Zhao decided to abandon BijieTech to create his own cryptocurrency exchange. He takes with him the best elements of his company and launches an Initial Coin Offering (ICO) in order to give birth to Binance.
CZ was right: his timing was ideal and Binance was a smash hit. In just six months, it established itself as the number one exchange in the world, and has never been dethroned since. The result of a mixture of work and success that perfectly characterizes the person of Changpeng Zhao.