employees

According to CoinDesk, affected by the situation in the Middle East, Binance is offering its employees in the UAE the option to temporarily relocate to Hong Kong, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, and Bangkok.A Binance spokesperson stated, "In light of the recent regional tensions, we are providing our employees with the option for temporary relocation as a precautionary measure prioritizing employee welfare, to offer flexibility and support during uncertain times." The spokesperson also mentioned that many employees are currently choosing to stay in the UAE, and the company's operations in the UAE remain normal.It is reported that Binance has about 1,000 employees in the UAE, accounting for 20% of its global workforce, and the company's global operations are also supported from Abu Dhabi. This relocation proposal comes after the signing of a ceasefire agreement. The regional conflict, which lasted for about six weeks, has impacted business activities in the UAE. Since the outbreak of the conflict in late February, the UAE has intercepted hundreds of missiles and drones, with another interception occurring on April 8.The conflict in the Middle East has affected several cryptocurrency and major events in the UAE: the TOKEN2049 Dubai summit has been postponed to 2027, the TON Gateway has been canceled due to safety and travel concerns, the Middle East Energy Dubai Exhibition and the Dubai International Boat Show have been postponed, and the Bahrain and Saudi Arabia F1 events, which have sponsorship exposure value for the crypto industry, are also facing cancellation.

According to Bloomberg, informed sources revealed that Anthropic employees have sold a portion of their equity to investors, completing a secondary equity sale that began earlier this year. However, due to the limited number of shares employees were willing to sell, some investors were unable to acquire as many shares as planned. Informed sources stated that the offer price for this acquisition is the same as the company's most recent financing valuation from February of this year. According to its latest transaction, the company's valuation is $350 billion.The total amount of the share sale has not been disclosed, but some individuals indicated that its scale is below the $6 billion raised by investors. Anthropic employees hope to retain more shares before the company's upcoming initial public offering (IPO), which is expected to take place as early as this year.One individual stated that this lower-than-expected transaction indicates that employees are optimistic about the company's prospects as its annual revenue rises. Last month, the company's annual revenue exceeded $19 billion. By April, Anthropic announced that its annual run rate revenue had surpassed $30 billion.

A number of former OpenAI employees have jointly established a venture capital fund called Zero Shot, with a target size of $100 million. The first round has raised approximately $20 million and completed several investments. The fund was initiated by Evan Morikawa, Andrew Mayne, Shawn Jain, among others, with Kelly Kovacs and Brett Rounsaville also participating.Invested projects include the enterprise automation platform Worktrace AI and the robotics company Foundry Robotics, among others. The team stated that they will focus on AI directions with long-term potential, while maintaining a cautious attitude towards certain sectors, including "vibe coding" platforms and robot video data training.

According to the New York Post, Meta is laying off hundreds of employees in Silicon Valley while the tech giant is heavily investing in artificial intelligence and considering cutting more than 20% of its total workforce. According to the latest state government filings, the parent company of Facebook will lay off nearly 200 employees in the San Francisco Bay Area. The layoffs will affect 124 employees in Burlingame, California, and 74 employees in nearby Sunnyvale. The documents indicate that these layoffs will take effect in late May, and all affected positions will be permanently eliminated.Experts say this move indicates that Meta is undergoing a major strategic transformation—from a labor-intensive operational model to a machine-driven system. Meta's recent AI-related initiatives include plans to invest $10 billion in building data centers in El Paso, Texas.Meta is also considering larger layoffs. Senior employees have been informed to prepare for layoffs that could affect more than 20% of the company's workforce—about 15,000 employees. In response to this plan, a Meta spokesperson stated, "This is speculative reporting about a theoretical proposal."If the layoffs proceed, it would be the largest layoff at Meta since more than 20,000 employees were cut during Zuckerberg's push for the company's "year of efficiency" in 2022 and 2023. In a Meta earnings call, Zuckerberg stated that due to the application of AI tools, Meta has begun to "see projects that previously required large teams now being completed by a very talented individual."

The U.S. Department of Justice's Northern California Prosecutor's Office announced that 10 executives and employees from four cryptocurrency market-making firms have been charged with allegedly manipulating token trading volumes and prices through wash trading, involving Gotbit, Vortex, Antier, and Contrarian.Three of the defendants have been extradited from Singapore to the U.S., and two others have pleaded guilty and been sentenced. The FBI and the IRS Criminal Investigation Division even created multiple cryptocurrency tokens during an undercover operation to investigate illegal volume manipulation and price inflation within the industry. Over $1 million in cryptocurrency assets have currently been seized.

According to CoinDesk, Galaxy founder Mike Novogratz stated that Galaxy will match deposits of $1,000 in "Trump Accounts" from the U.S. Treasury for the children of eligible employees.

According to Fortune, Kalshi's early employee Adhi Rajaprabhakaran has established a fund named 5c(c) Capital, which has raised $35 million to invest in startups in the prediction market.It is reported that the partners of the fund include Adhi Rajaprabhakaran, who is the second trader hired by the market maker under Kalshi; the other partner of the fund is Noah Zingler-Sternig, the former operations chief of Kalshi.Documents show that, in addition to Kalshi CEO Tarek Mansour and Polymarket CEO Shayne Coplan, early supporters of the fund also include venture capital giant Marc Andreessen (investing through his fund Moneta Luna); Micky Malka, founder of fintech investment firm Ribbit Capital; and Kyle Samani, former managing partner of cryptocurrency venture capital firm Multicoin Capital.

According to Cointelegraph, payment company Block (which owns Square, Cash App, and Afterpay) has quietly recalled some employees this month after laying off about 4,000 people at the end of February this year. Several employees have stated on LinkedIn that they received invitations to return, citing reasons such as "administrative errors" and a shortage of personnel for key infrastructure.CEO Jack Dorsey previously acknowledged that the layoff decision may have been a mistake and stated that the rapid development of AI technology prompted the company to restructure its team of 6,000 people. Some of the laid-off employees believe that the layoffs were more about boosting investor confidence rather than purely due to considerations of AI replacement. Currently, Block's official website lists only 27 job vacancies, all of which are management or sales positions.

According to a report by Reuters, Meta is planning large-scale layoffs that could affect 20% or more of its employees. This move aims to offset investments in artificial intelligence infrastructure and prepare for the higher efficiency brought by AI-assisted employees. The layoff date has not yet been determined, and the scale has not been finalized.

Aurelion (NASDAQ: AURE) announced the arrival of the company's first AI virtual employee, Duncan.Aure, and opened access to its AI Agent Skills. This AI Agent has established a dedicated website and is live on social platforms such as X and Telegram, supporting automated trading and strategy execution for XAU₮ through preset Skills modules.Aurelion stated that Duncan is an important exploration for the company in the direction of digital gold infrastructure. In the future, the company will continue to strengthen the strategic positioning of XAU₮ assets while expanding the execution capabilities of the AI Agent in digital gold trading and asset management scenarios, and exploring innovative scenarios such as XAU₮ Shop, allowing digital gold to have more practical applications.

According to market news, due to the sudden escalation of geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, Binance has issued an internal security announcement requiring all employees in the UAE to immediately avoid outdoor activities and stay in safe indoor areas.Recently, Iran launched ballistic missiles towards Israeli/U.S. military targets, some of which flew over or were aimed at the UAE. Although most were intercepted by air defense systems, the UAE government issued an emergency safety alert to all residents early this morning.

Jack Dorsey's payment service provider Block plans to lay off over 4,000 employees, with a layoff rate close to 50%. Its co-founder Jack Dorsey stated that this move is related to the rapid development of AI, and he chose to take immediate action rather than a gradual layoff, believing that multiple rounds of layoffs would undermine morale, focus, and the trust of customers and shareholders.Affected employees will receive 20 weeks of salary, an additional week of salary for each year of service, 6 months of health insurance, company office equipment, and a $5,000 transition assistance.

On-chain detective ZachXBT posted on platform X that it will release a major investigative report on a highly profitable company in the crypto industry on February 26. The report reveals that several employees of the company have been abusing internal data for insider trading over an extended period.

Binance co-founder He Yi responded on platform X to the news that "Binance employees were fired for discovering transactions related to Iran," stating that compliance staff need to handle various types of cases in their actual work. In recent years, Binance has proactively initiated multiple investigations related to potential crimes and has handed over the results to law enforcement agencies, while also assisting users in avoiding potential fraud and financial losses through risk control and compliance measures.In the face of a constantly changing regulatory environment and new types of financial crime, the company's compliance system still needs to be continuously upgraded and optimized. He also expressed gratitude to former employees who participated in the company's compliance efforts and emphasized that as the company continues to promote higher standards of compliance, it may not be possible to satisfy everyone during the execution process. However, Binance will continue to invest resources and bring in more compliance professionals with specialized backgrounds and law enforcement collaboration experience to enhance overall risk identification, investigation, and resolution capabilities.

According to market news, the California Public Employees' Retirement Fund increased its holdings in Bitcoin treasury company Strategy (stock code: MSTR) by 22,475 shares, bringing its total holdings to 470,632 shares, valued at approximately $59 million.The retirement fund manages assets of approximately $611 billion.

The founder of Binance, CZ, stated in an interview with the All-In podcast, "I first met SBF at the Singapore conference in 2019. FTX had proposed forming a joint venture (JV), which was initially rejected. A subsequent proposal led to Binance investing in a 20% stake in FTX. During this process, some issues arose, including malicious defamation and poaching of employees, leading to our exit from the investment in July 2021, and we were not deeply involved as investors. There are still ongoing lawsuits, and the bankruptcy proceedings and compensation situation for FTX remain unclear."Additionally, CZ revealed that applying for a pardon requires a petition written by a lawyer, stating reasons such as whether there is excessive prosecution and whether the parties have good character, etc. The final decision rests entirely with the President of the United States, and there is no fixed or standardized procedure. Historically, most U.S. presidents typically issue pardons on their last day in office, but Biden has also granted "early pardons." CZ believes that obtaining a pardon is crucial for Binance to enter the U.S. market smoothly and compliantly, and he also thinks that the legal issues faced by Trump may, to some extent, aid in the success of the pardon application.

According to market news, employees of the South Korean cryptocurrency exchange Bithumb mistakenly distributed 2000 BTC instead of the intended 2000 KRW as rewards, resulting in hundreds of users unexpectedly receiving the airdrop. As a result of this incident, the price of Bitcoin on the Bithumb platform temporarily dropped by 10% compared to other markets.

According to Caixin, from January 29 to 30, within less than 24 hours, the usually safe Tokyo, Japan, and Hong Kong, China, experienced consecutive robberies targeting large amounts of cash in yen, with the amounts involved reaching 420 million yen (approximately 19 million RMB) and 51 million yen (approximately 2.29 million RMB), respectively.About 6 hours after the incidents, the police arrested 3 suspects at Hong Kong International Airport on charges of "robbery" as they were attempting to leave the country. Additionally, 2 staff members at a virtual currency exchange store in Tsim Sha Tsui were arrested, including a 28-year-old local man and a 29-year-old man from mainland China, who are suspected of assisting the robbers in handling part of the stolen money.Preliminary intelligence analysis indicates that the relevant Japanese companies may have been profiting by carrying yen cash to Hong Kong to exchange for Hong Kong dollars, and then purchasing duty-free goods in Hong Kong to take advantage of the tax price differences between the two regions.