Amid the bankruptcy proceedings, the Canadian celebrity entrepreneur and FTX investor star Kevin O’Leary sharply criticized crypto exchange Binance and its CEO Changpeng Zhao, a/k/a CZ, claiming they intentionally caused FTX’s collapse. At a hearing of the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, the prominent businessman said Binance is now a “massive, unregulated monopoly.”
Kevin O’Leary, who was heavily invested in FTX and its paid spokesman, said: “I have an opinion, not the records. One put the other out of business – intentionally.”
Binance, the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange, used to be an early investor in FTX and played a decisive role in its collapse in November 2022. Binance CEO Changpeng “CZ” Zhao announced he would sell the exchange’s holdings of FTX’s native token, FTT, triggering a liquidity crisis.
In his public statements, Kevin O’Leary has said that he did not know Binance was an investor at the time he joined FTX. CZ called him a liar for this, which angered O’Leary.
To us, O’Leary’s statements already sound a lot like dismissing one’s own guilt and looking for others to blame. The blame game has long since begun and Kevin O’Leary is one of the big players.