Binance and WazirX: Clash of the Exchanges

Source: Unsplash

The founders of the Binance and WazirX are engaged in a verbal battle, swapping accusations and denials on Twitter, a day after Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao claimed that the international cryptocurrency exchange didn’t own a stake in WazirX’s parent company Zanmai Labs.

However, the founder of WazirX says otherwise. Nischal Shetty, the creator of WazirX, stated on Saturday that Binance’s parent firm was a party to the agreement his company made. Shetty took to Twitter to express his opinions.

Source: Twitter

He continued by saying that WazirX technology was sold as part of the deal. He added that CZ’s company then licenced the same technology to Zanmai for the INR market.

WazirX is run by an Indian company called Zanmai Labs. According to company papers, Zettai Pte Ltd, a Singapore-registered firm, owns 99.99 percent of the Indian entity and 0.01 percent is held by Shetty. According to a source, Shetty, cofounder Siddharth Menon, and Sameer Mhatre are all equal owners of Zettai.

Funds on Wazirx to transfer to Binance?

CZ took to Twitter on 6 August 2022 to advise WazirX users to move their money to Binance. He continues by saying that his company could technically disable WazirX wallets, but they can’t or won’t. CZ assures users that his firm can’t and won’t hurt users.

Source: Twitter

According to sources, as of February, WazirX had more than 10 million registered users.

CZ claims that the WazirX founding team continued to be in charge of platform operations and that Binance was never granted access to user information, control over KYC, etc. He continues by saying that his company would be thrilled to cooperate with ED to address these problems with WazirX.

WazirX and Binance’s relationship has soured as a result of the Enforcement Directorate (ED) announcing on Friday that it had recently searched the offices of Zanmai Labs’ directors and had given them an order to freeze their bank balance of Rs 64.67 crore.

The government claims that WazirX “actively” assisted about 16 fintech firms that are under investigation for alleged money laundering to shift alleged criminal proceeds using cryptocurrencies. According to local sources, ED is requesting data from a number of cryptocurrency exchanges under the Foreign Exchange Management Act (Fema). WazirX has also been charged by the ED with having a convoluted ownership structure.