Star Xu calls CZ a ‘liar’ as founders of world’s largest crypto exchanges argue over past allegations
The dispute between the crypto exchange founders, which included a $1 billion wager from CZ, revives allegations dating back 11 years to Zhao’s time at OKCoin.
What to know:
- A long-simmering feud between OKX founder Star Xu and Binance founder Changpeng Zhao has reignited after the release of Zhao’s memoir, prompting Xu to again accuse Zhao of lying about a decade-old contract dispute.
- Xu has resurfaced allegations from Zhao’s 2015 stint at OKCoin, sharing a video he says shows conflicting contract versions and calling Zhao a “habitual liar” who misled the public about the controversy.
- The clash has expanded beyond business disputes to personal matters, with Xu questioning Zhao’s marital disclosures and Binance stake in the context of his divorce, and Zhao responding that he is officially divorced while rejecting Xu’s inquiries as irrelevant.
This latest flare-up also follows an earlier public disagreement in January, when Xu blamed Binance-linked market dynamics for amplifying the Oct. 10 crypto crash, a claim Binance and other market participants disputed. The latest flare-up was triggered by CZ’s memoir, published earlier this week, Xu said.
He revived the decade-old issues, saying he had no “intention of revisiting these old issues involving CZ [..] but since I’ve been dragged into this again because of the book, let’s restate the facts,” he wrote.
“Out of the blue, Star [Xu] said that I had somehow forged a contract when working there [at OKCoin],” CZ said in his book. “… In May 2015, I got annoyed and made a public post on Reddit, obviously denying forging any contracts … while I was at it, I detailed a few problems I saw at OKCoin.”
