BCR Podcast #41: Binance Under Fire in Brazil with Cláudio Rabin of Portal do Bitcoin

Olá Pessoal and Happy Tiradentes Day! News broke last week that the CVM, the Brazilian SEC, referred Binance to federal prosecutors late last year for investigation into the exchange’s derivatives offerings in what appears to be defiance of a stop order. Further reporting this week has revealed that the CVM’s inquiry began in June 2022 after a Binance customer service representative told a Portal do Bitcoin reporter, posing as a trader, that he could access the derivatives products by simply changing the language on the Binance platform from Brazilian Portuguese to Portuguese from Portugal. This came after the CVM issued Binance a cease-and-desist order, claiming that the exchange did not have proper authorization to offer these products to Brazilian customers. In December 2022, the CVM referred the matter to federal prosecutors in São Paulo for further investigation asserting that there appears to be evidence of criminal activity. This is an important developing story, so I asked Cláudio Rabin, editor-in chief of Portal do Bitcoin, to come on and discuss what his team has learned thus far about these investigations over the last week and what might happen next. Cláudio also discusses his team’s extensive investigation into Binance’s opaque operating structure in Brazil, which is centered around a shell entity known as B Fintech. Binance is the largest and most systemically important crypto exchange both in Brazil and worldwide, so this is a story that we’ll be tracking closely as new developments come in. (P.S. Apologies as the audio on this recording did not turn out as well as hoped) You can listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts as well! Have a great weekend everybody!-AWSThanks for reading Brazil Crypto Report! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support my work. Get full access to Brazil Crypto Report at brazilcrypto.substack.com/subscribe