Binance CEO Richard Teng speaks at an event hosted by the local Foreign Correspondents Association in Singapore on September 17, 2024.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Richard Teng, CEO of cryptocurrency exchange Binance, told CNBC on Wednesday that the number of institutional and corporate investors joining the platform has increased by 40% this year.
“Institutional allocation to cryptocurrencies is just the tip of the iceberg. It’s just the beginning because many institutions are still doing their due diligence,” Teng said on the sidelines of the Token2049 conference in Singapore. he Taking office as CEO in November 2023.
“So for ourselves, we’ve seen a significant increase in the number of institutional and corporate investors. This year alone we’ve seen a 40% increase in entry into that category,” he said. Teng did not name the specific companies or reveal their size.
The growth reflects how so-called big money is heating up Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, are now willing to cooperate with an exchange that was the subject of a U.S. investigation and received a $4.3 billion settlement.
Billionaire Binance co-founder and former CEO Changpeng Zhao resigned last year as part of the settlement. Teng said Zhao remains a major shareholder.
Teng noted how Binance has transformed from a founder-led company to one led by a board of seven directors — a structure he said regulators are more accustomed to.
Teng joined Binance in 2021 as CEO of the company’s Singapore operations. He previously served as Chief Executive Officer of the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Abu Dhabi Global Market and Chief Regulatory Officer of Singapore Exchange.
Launched in 2009, Bitcoin paved the way for many other cryptocurrencies based on similar blockchain technology. The technology eliminates the need for third-party intermediaries by quickly creating a permanent and secure record of transactions between two parties.
More institutions move in
After years of regulatory uncertainty, the U.S. approved the The first exchange-traded fund targeting the spot price of Bitcoin. In July, the United States allowed trading of another cryptocurrency, ether, for similar funds.
Teng said this regulatory clarity “will bring certainty to mainstream users.” He attributed Bitcoin’s all-time high earlier this year (over $70,000 in March) to “institutional influence.”
He noted how BlackRock CEO Larry Fink went from being a Bitcoin skeptic to calling it “digital gold.”
The company and other traditional Wall Street investment firms such as Franklin Templeton have also issued ETFs for Bitcoin and Ethereum.
Franklin Templeton CEO Jenny Johnson told CNBC in May that Bitcoin’s rise at the time was due to “the first wave of early adopters.” She said she expects another wave of “bigger institutions” to buy into cryptocurrency funds.
As of Wednesday afternoon Singapore time, Bitcoin was trading near $60,440.
Teng declined to reveal specific price predictions, but noted that cryptocurrency prices tend to “heat up” 160 days after Bitcoin experiences its “halving” technical event. The last such event was in April.
As of Wednesday, Teng noted that the market was “nine days away from those 160 days.”
—CNBC’s Ryan Browne, MacKenzie Sigalos and Jesse Pound contributed to this report.
About The Author
