Changpeng Zhao invests in decentralized trading platforms, aiming to create an "On-Chain Binance"?

Even after stepping down as CEO of Binance at the end of 2023, Zhao Changpeng (CZ)'s every move—whether public statements or behind-the-scenes investments—continues to be regarded as an important market indicator in the cryptocurrency space. Recently, a piece of news has once again brought the spotlight onto this industry giant: CZ’s family office YZi Labs made a strategic investment of up to “tens of millions of dollars” in a decentralized trading platform called Genius Trading, and CZ himself will serve as an advisor to the project.

This move immediately sparked lively discussion within the community. Does this mean that CZ, after leaving his self-built centralized exchange empire, is quietly laying out his next grand blueprint—a “on-chain Binance” built entirely on blockchain, where users self-custody their assets?

Genius Trading

To understand the deeper meaning behind CZ’s move, we must first delve into what Genius Trading actually is. According to its team, Genius Trading is not just another ordinary decentralized exchange (DEX), but a “one-stop trading terminal” aimed at unifying all on-chain trading activities. Its vision is grand: enabling users to seamlessly trade assets across more than 10 mainstream blockchains (including BNB Chain, Ethereum, Solana, Avalanche, Sui, etc.) within a single interface, without the hassle of cross-chain bridges or switching between different wallets.

The platform’s feature set is comprehensive, covering spot trading, perpetual contracts, and even copy trading, which is popular among retail traders. Ryan Myher, co-founder and COO of Genius Trading, directly expressed their ambition: “If we were to rebuild Binance from scratch today, we would definitely not choose the centralized exchange model, but instead build it on-chain. Genius is our ultimate realization of this idea: a unified terminal, fully self-custodied, with no compromise on performance and user experience.”

This declaration almost signals that their goal is to replicate Binance’s success in the centralized world and to expand it within the decentralized domain. CZ’s involvement undoubtedly provides the strongest endorsement for this ambitious vision.

On-Chain Privacy

Among the many features, one particularly eye-catching aspect of Genius Trading’s technical blueprint is its pursuit of transaction privacy. In the current on-chain environment, all transactions are transparent, making it easy for whales (large holders) or professional traders’ strategies to be tracked and mimicked, even exploited by “scientists” using MEV (Maximum Extractable Value) for front-running.

Genius Trading proposes a novel solution. It allows users to automatically split a large transaction into hundreds or even thousands of smaller trades, executed through hundreds of different wallet addresses. While all transaction records remain on-chain, it becomes extremely difficult for external observers to piece together these fragmented trades and identify the underlying strategy. More importantly, this privacy protection method avoids using zero-knowledge proofs (ZK-proofs) or complex off-chain computation components, thus ensuring fast transaction execution and avoiding potential latency issues.

Armaan Kalsi, co-founder and CEO of the platform, explained: “Speculative activity can indeed help the platform attract users quickly in the early stages, but once users truly understand the underlying value of blockchain technology, they will seek long-term usage. At that stage, privacy becomes a key moat for retaining these mature users.” This deep understanding of privacy demonstrates a mature thinking that goes beyond short-term hype, focusing on long-term ecosystem development.

CZ’s Dual Roles

Interestingly, while CZ invests in Genius Trading—an “serious” DeFi infrastructure project—he also plays a completely different role in public: cooling down overheated market sentiment.

In early 2026, as the market seemed to enter another “meme coin” cycle, various tokens themed around jokes and satire flooded on-chain. CZ’s tweets, even if just casual jokes, were often interpreted by the community and quickly led to the creation of meme coins with the same name, sparking blind retail enthusiasm.

In response, CZ clearly warned: “I’m not against meme coins; I like memes myself. But if you blindly buy every new meme coin based on my random tweets, you’re almost certainly going to lose money.” He emphasized that most of the time, he is just posting “stupid and not very funny jokes,” and does not consider meme coins or give any investment advice.

Looking at these two aspects together, we see a more three-dimensional and profound CZ. On one hand, as a “builder” of the market, he invests his funds and efforts into projects like Genius Trading that have long-term value and technical depth, committed to advancing the maturity and robustness of DeFi infrastructure. He envisions a safer, more private, and more efficient decentralized financial future.

On the other hand, he plays the role of a “market cool-down” agent, leveraging his influence to advise retail investors against being fooled by short-term speculative bubbles. He understands that a healthy crypto market cannot be built solely on baseless speculative frenzy. This “narrative heating, capital cooling” market segmentation also confirms his judgment: despite the high discussion volume around meme coins, institutional capital and “smart money” are flowing into Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other more certain sectors, rather than highly volatile speculative assets.

Decentralized Landscape

CZ’s investment and advisory role in Genius Trading is far from a simple financial operation. It is more like a strategic declaration, marking his personal transition from managing Binance’s frontline to injecting his extensive experience and industry insights into the next wave of crypto—an era centered on self-custody, cross-chain interoperability, and transaction privacy.

The label “On-Chain Binance” may be the most straightforward description of Genius Trading, but its core goes far beyond that. It represents an evolution: from reliance on platform trust in centralized models to a future where user rights are protected by code and cryptography, moving toward decentralization.

CZ’s actions clearly outline a dual-track path: publicly, he interacts with the market, guiding the community to focus on long-term value and warning against speculative risks; privately, he makes precise “bets” on foundational projects capable of building the future DeFi skyscraper. Perhaps, when we look back at the history of crypto finance someday, we will find that CZ’s support for Genius Trading was a key step in opening a new chapter in his career and leading the entire industry toward a higher stage.