Binance.US Names Brian Shroder New President

Cryptocurrency exchange firm Binance.US has announced Brian Shroder as its new president, a move that will add stability to the company in the wake of the resignation of CEO Brian Brooks last month, Bloomberg reported Thursday (Sept. 9).

Read more: Binance’s US CEO Quits Citing ‘Differences Over Strategic Direction

Shroder, who was an executive at Ant Group and Uber Technologies, will oversee strategy, execution, fundraising, business and corporate development for Binance.US. As president, Shroder will manage other aspects of the business, including legal, human resources and product and technology functions, according to a press release.

Brooks resigned after a few months at the helm in the midst of compliance setbacks and regulatory scrutiny related to Binance.US’s sister company.

Shroder said in the company statement that he is looking “forward to sharing our exciting story with the broader investment community as we begin our journey toward IPO.”

Binance.US shares a name with Binance Holdings Ltd., the world’s biggest crypto exchange. Launched in 2019, Binance.US has Changpeng Zhao serving as chairman of the board. Zhao is also CEO of Binance Holdings, which is currently under investigation by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) to determine whether its platform helped with money laundering and tax evasion, Bloomberg reported.

Several countries are conducting their own investigations into Binance and have said the company must change its processes or stop operating in those nations, according to a CoinDesk report in July. Among the countries that have filed complaints or notices that Binance is not authorized to do business there are the U.K., Japan, Thailand and South Africa.

Zhao has said that Binance.US will likely soon close a fundraising round and will eventually go public to better compete with its rival Coinbase, Reuters reported.

“Based on our current trajectory, I believe we could have an extremely successful IPO in the next two to three years,” Shroder said in response to a question from Bloomberg. Binance.US would look to close its “first seed round by the end of the year.”

Meanwhile, Binance is integrating an intermediate verification stipulation for all users, adding to the startup’s know your customer (KYC) and anti-money laundering (AML) protocols.

Read more: Binance Adds Intermediate Verification to KYC for Added Security

The company has also invested in senior compliance talent, compliance technology, updates to application programming interface (API) services and more.