Binance Changes Finance Chiefs Days After Its Record $6.3 Billion Theft

Binance said on Saturday that its chief financial officer, Kaiser Ng, is leaving the company and will be succeeded by Justin Yek.

Binance is the world's biggest cryptocurrency exchange. Co-Chief Executive Officer Yi He framed the change as a planned transition, not a sudden break.

“Kaiser Ng has decided to pursue a new venture after more than five years at Binance, with a transition plan implemented over the last half year,” Yi He said in a statement on Saturday.

The change takes effect immediately, Bloomberg reported. Binance announced the succession on Saturday, November 7, nine days after the October 29 theft unfolded.

The two finance chiefs

Ng has been Binance's chief financial officer since January 2022, and he has spent more than five years at the exchange in total. Before Binance, he worked at rival exchange Kraken, according to his LinkedIn profile, Reuters reported.

The chief financial officer is the executive responsible for a company's finances. That includes how the company meets obligations such as the reimbursement Binance has pledged to affected customers.

Yek was most recently vice-president of finance at Airwallex, a cross-border payments company. Earlier, he led Morgan Stanley's Southeast Asian technology investment banking business and worked at Citigroup, Bloomberg reported.

Why the timing draws scrutiny

The announcement comes just over a week after the theft that unfolded on October 29. Binance has said the breach began months earlier, with the compromise of several employees' computers.

The company has said malware was hidden in software downloads and fake job recruitment efforts targeting engineers. The $6.3 billion theft is the largest cryptocurrency theft on record, as TickerGrove reported in its earlier coverage.

No source checked for this article evidences a link between the departure and the hack. The timing places a leadership change in the middle of a reimbursement, while the company's own account is that the succession was prepared over the last half year.

The recovery the new chief inherits

Binance has said it will fully reimburse affected customers, and it has repeatedly pledged that it, not customers, bears the loss. TickerGrove reported on November 1 that the exchange had covered 95 percent of the stolen assets, up from 90 percent a day earlier.