Binance appointed co-founder Yi He as co-CEO, elevating one of its earliest architects to a formal leadership role alongside chief executive Richard Teng.
In a Wednesday announcement on stage at Binance Blockchain Week, Binance CEO Richard Teng said co-founder Yi He had been appointed co-CEO. Teng said He “has been an integral part of the executive leadership team since the launch of Binance,” calling the appointment “a natural progression.”
Teng added that He, Binance’s chief marketing officer before her appointment as co-CEO, is crucial in expanding Binance’s community and driving product innovation. Yi He said that sharing the CEO role with Teng will leverage two very different perspectives, with Teng bringing his experience in regulated financial markets.
Yi He is a crypto native who co-founded Binance in 2017 alongside Changpeng “CZ” Zhao.
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Two backgrounds, one leadership team
Teng was appointed as Binance’s CEO back in late November 2023 after CZ resigned and pleaded guilty to charges levied against him by the US Department of Justice. Before that, Teng had served as the company’s head of regional markets outside the United States.
Teng started his career as an auditor at the Big Four auditing firm PricewaterhouseCoopers before joining the Monetary Authority of Singapore in 1997, where he worked for 13 years, holding senior roles, including director of corporate finance.
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Yi He has well over a decade of experience at the forefront of the crypto industry and was among the Binance leaders who helped the platform rise to become a market leader.
She not only co-founded Binance in 2017 and OkCoin in 2014 — the crypto exchange now known as OKX — but also headed Binance’s venture capital arm, Binance Labs, since 2022 and led the exchange’s business, marketing, and branding strategy.
He was also reported to own at least 10% of a Cayman-registered holding company associated with Binance back in 2023, according to The Wall Street Journal.
“She was also a fundamental part of the fundraising strategy that drove the firm’s valuation to [over $3] billion,” Binance’s about page states.
Binance launched a concierge-style service in November designed for family offices, asset managers and private funds that are unfamiliar with crypto. Binance also began accepting BlackRock’s USD Institutional Digital Liquidity Fund as off-exchange collateral, allowing institutions to trade while keeping their assets with custodians.
At the end of September, the exchange launched its own crypto-as-a-service solution for licensed banks, brokerages and stock exchanges looking to offer crypto services to their clients. In early August, Binance partnered with BBVA, one of Spain’s biggest banks, to act as an independent custodian for customer funds.
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