[rich_sasha]

I know this is how the US operates, still it's weird to trade cash for criminal allegations. Especially when Binance has been so vilified.

I'm not defending Binance, rather, it feels like the SEC rhetoric went past the point where a fine is appropriate.

Unless they are only proposing it so they can't be accused of not giving them the same treatment that everyone else gets.

[pavlov]

It seems like the deal would be more like probation where Binance would remain monitored after paying the fine:

"If Binance and the DOJ agree on a deferred-prosecution-agreement, the Justice Department would file a criminal complaint against the company. The US would not go forward with a prosecution as long as the company meets prescribed conditions, which usually include paying a substantial penalty and agreeing to a detailed statement of facts outlining its wrongdoing. A process would be set up to monitor the company’s compliance."

Also there might be personal criminal charges against CZ:

"Negotiations between the Justice Department and Binance include the possibility that its founder Changpeng Zhao would face criminal charges in the US under an agreement to resolve the probe into alleged money laundering, bank fraud and sanctions violations, according to people familiar with the discussions.

"Zhao, also known as “CZ,” is residing in the United Arab Emirates, which doesn’t have an extradition treaty with the US, but that doesn’t prevent him from coming voluntarily."

LOL at the "coming voluntarily" part though...

[fredgrott]

it's oh UEA you want protection of your oil tanker traffic from Iran missile hits, guess what let's trade....

[inhumantsar]

Residing in the UAE also wouldn't prevent extraordinary rendition should it come to that...

[arcticbull]

No need to go that far. The lack of an extradition treaty doesn’t preclude extradition. Instead of having a formalized process in place it would have to be done case by case. This is a common misconception about extradition treaties in general.

[Scoundreller]

And sometimes you’re safe despite the existence of an extradition treaty. France has a bunch of extradition treaties but they’ll only let them be used against non-citizens.

[ender341341]

A lot of countries will only really extradite non-citizens, especially the more powerful they are.

[bmurray7jhu]

Deportation often amounts to a facto extradition.

[CrzyLngPwd]

Just say kidnapping. It's not like it's North America's first time.

[TacticalCoder]

> I know this is how the US operates, still it's weird to trade cash for criminal allegations.

It's not just the US. Spain is accusing Shakira of financial fraud (spending more than 183 days over a year from 2012 to 2014 in Spain --for she had a spanish lover--, without paying her taxes in Spain) and she had to pay something like 16 millions plus six months in jail but they recently settled on an additional 8 millions or something and no jail time.

I mean: it's not exactly the same but they still traded cash for part of the sentence.

P.S: Spain is also apparently now going after her for year 2018.

[advisedwang]

Lets say this goes to trial and Binance is convicted. What will the sentence be? A fine. Allowing them to pay now without the trial basically is like a plea deal (or pleading guilty for a reduced sentence). Presumably this is less than the DoJ thinks the fine+court costs would be if they went to trial.

[dragonwriter]

> I know this is how the US operates, still it's weird to trade cash for criminal allegations.

I would imagine that the US is not unique in either (1) making corporations liable for crime, or (2) having the principal sanction against the corporation itself for any crime be either monetary or a combination of monetary sanction and injunction or similar behavioral controls.

[echelon]

You can't imprison or kill [1] a company.

You can impose civil or criminal penalties on the directors, but the shareholders are also (perhaps rightly) punished when you impose fines.

A government can also seize a company's assets and redistribute them to recover costs, but in doing so you often dismantle the value.

[1] (At least not in the same way you can impose capital punishment on a human.)

[justinclift]

But it really seems more like the US doesn't care about stopping the criminal behaviour.

If they did care, then paying (some amount) to get off scott free wouldn't be an option.

The current approach of allowing payola (like this) just encourages bad actors.

[robocat]

Feels like extortion.

The Mafia's bigger brother.

[bilbo0s]

I'd be much more concerned about what this offer indicates regarding the new goodies that the shadow side of the US government has leveraged out of Binance.

In the long run, I'd wager the US government will be getting information and services worth a good deal more than USD4Billion out of Binance and ancillary organizations.

Still, if you can make as much money as Binance has allegedly been making, and sure, sell out a few of your customers, but now you can keep all that money free and clear legally? That's a pretty good trade assuming you're not some privacy nut or anything.

As a bonus, the shadow side of the US government will probably be pretty keen on protecting you from any of your less savory customers. Just so they can keep the whole thing rolling as long as possible.

This could be a good outcome for Binance.