Binance.us stoppas från alla amerikanska banker!

One US prosecutor, who asked not to be named because they weren't authorized to speak to media about the case, calls the degree of access to Binance's records described in the agreement "kind of crazy," and remains in disbelief at the idea of Binance abiding by the settlement. "I don't know what kind of business would want to operate while allowing that much government oversight, especially one that's deliberately stayed out of the US so that they're not under our nose," they say. "The other option must have been really bad."

The crackdown doesn't just mean a chastened Binance will have to change its practices going forward. It means that when the company is sentenced in a matter of months, it will be forced to open its past books to regulators, too. What was once a haven for anarchic crypto commerce is about to be transformed into the opposite: perhaps the most fed-friendly business in the cryptocurrency industry, retroactively offering more than a half-decade of users' transaction records to US regulators and law enforcement.