Binance Co-Founder Uses Simpsons Characters as Aliases
Binance co-founder Changpeng Zhao and Yi He use the characters Homer and Marjorie (shortened to Marge) from "The Simpsons" as aliases in internal meetings and chats at the exchange and its subsidiaries. Sources say the aliases are playful and indicate that the two have been active throughout the ecosystem, including at BNB Chain meetings and CoinMarketCap subsidiaries.
Close associates of Zhao confirmed that the former CEO has indeed used the alias Homer. A former employee provided CoinDesk with a screenshot of a meeting where Yi He was displayed as Marge, stating that she still uses this name in meetings and internal chats. The characters are entirely yellow, corresponding to Binance's branding and marketing colors. The alias is not a one-time joke but has become an internal habit; Yi He later adopted Marjorie as a commonly used internal English name, with colleagues emphasizing it is not meant to conceal her identity.
Yi He currently serves as co-CEO alongside Richard Teng, having been promoted from head of customer service in December 2025. The two met in 2014 at OKCoin (now OKX), where Yi He recruited Zhao as the technical lead, and they co-founded Binance in 2017. They are both business partners and long-term companions with children. Zhao resigned after pleading guilty to U.S. anti-money laundering charges in 2023, paying a $50 million fine and serving nearly four months in prison, with Teng taking over; Zhao was later pardoned. Teng focuses on compliance and expansion externally, while Yi He emphasizes products, users, and culture.
Following the news, related meme tokens quickly appeared on-chain. Binance remains the largest cryptocurrency exchange globally, with daily spot trading volumes exceeding $18 billion and nearly 300 million users. The aliases also appeared in channels of the parent company and subsidiaries, indicating that the founders have not withdrawn from daily meetings despite changes in their roles.
Publicly, they are known as CZ and co-CEO, while behind closed doors, they are Homer and Marge. The yellow branding has been incorporated into internal nomenclature, effectively turning the visual system into an organizational code. Teng is the external face of regulatory narratives, while the alias system indicates that the founding team is still speaking in ecosystem meetings.
In market mechanisms, this is a cultural symbol being priced, not a product launch. The buyers are on-chain speculators turning founder details into memes; the sellers are insiders and channels for sharing screenshots. Funds flow from attention to the similarly named tokens, not to exchange fees. Beneficiaries are meme issuers who can quickly launch tokens; the pressured party is the compliance team that must explain the "delegated authority" to regulators—aliases prove that the founders are still in the meeting rooms of BNB Chain and market subsidiaries. The event driver is media verification of internal nomenclature, with liquidity following the nicknames.
Source: Public Information
ABAB AI Insight
The power transition at Binance has never been a disconnection but a change of name tags. Zhao resigned after pleading guilty, with Teng taking the external regulatory role; Yi He was promoted to co-CEO, focusing on users and culture while still being called Marge internally. Homer has not returned to the CEO position on paper but appears on subsidiary meeting lists. The alias writes "still present" into the contact list, more solid than a press release.
The capital path is that the founding couple integrates the exchange, public chain, and market entry into the same daily routine. In 2014, Yi He brought Zhao into OKCoin, and in 2017, they moved liquidity to Binance together. Since then, ecosystem expansion has relied on listings, BNB, and the acquisition of CoinMarketCap, rather than removing founders from group chats. The yellow logo becoming Homer and Marge turns brand color into an internal password. Meme coins merely translate the password into tradable code, with pricing power still residing with those who can appear in those meetings.
Comparable examples include Elon Musk's internal nicknames in X and Tesla groups, as well as SoftBank's Masayoshi Son using animal codenames for appointments: both use humor to solidify power radius. OKX was their starting point, while Binance is an amplified family workshop with a global clearing layer. The current phase is "compliance shell, founder core"—externally, there are dual CEOs, while internally, the same pair of yellow characters continues to speak.
Structural judgment belongs to capital concentration. The mechanism is: exchange licenses can have different names, but meeting display names do not change. Regulators look at Teng's resume, while the ecosystem observes who is nodding in the chats of BNB Chain and market subsidiaries. Aliases are not a form of invisibility but a shortcut through the organizational chart. When the meme market starts trading Homer and Marge, it indicates that pricing has shifted from the licensing narrative back to whether the founders are still present in body.
ABAB News · Cognitive Laws
- Positions can be transferred, but meeting display names do not automatically transfer.
- Brand colors written into nicknames serve as evidence that power is still present.
- Regulators look at the structure, while the ecosystem observes who is still speaking in the group.