Binance's CZ and Yi He Ran a $100B Exchange as Homer and Marge Simpson

Binance's CZ and Yi He Ran a $100B Exchange as Homer and Marge Simpson

The co-founders of the world's largest crypto exchange by volume conducted internal company meetings under cartoon aliases — Changpeng 'CZ' Zhao operated as 'Homer,' and co-founder Yi He went by 'Marge,' after the iconic Simpsons couple.

This wasn't a one-off joke. According to CoinDesk, the aliases were used routinely inside Binance during meetings and internal chats. And here's the detail that should make you pause: Yi He, now co-CEO of Binance alongside Richard Teng, still uses the name Marge in meetings and communications today.

Why This Actually Matters

At first glance, this reads like a quirky fun fact. Look closer and it tells you something important about how Binance was — and arguably still is — run.

Binance grew into the dominant force in global crypto under an internal culture that was deliberately informal, pseudonymous, and opaque. The same instinct that drove CZ to champion crypto's anonymous, decentralized ethos was apparently baked into the company's own internal operations. When your founders are cosplaying as cartoon characters in board-level discussions, you are not running a conventional financial institution.

That culture helped Binance move fast, dominate markets, and outmaneuver regulators for years. It also contributed to the compliance failures that eventually caught up with the exchange. In November 2023, Binance agreed to a $4.3 billion settlement with U.S. authorities, and CZ stepped down as CEO, later serving a four-month prison sentence.

CZ is now gone from the day-to-day. Richard Teng holds the CEO title. But Yi He, the original 'Marge,' remains co-CEO and a central power at the exchange. The fact that she still uses the alias is not just nostalgic, it signals continuity of the original founding culture inside a company that is simultaneously trying to convince global regulators it has professionalised.

The Tension Binance Cannot Escape

Binance is in an awkward position. It needs to present a compliance-first, institutional-grade face to regulators in the EU, Middle East, and Asia while retaining the loyalty of a retail crypto base that loved it precisely because it felt anti-establishment.

Homer and Marge running internal meetings is charming lore when you're a scrappy startup. It reads differently when you're the exchange responsible for a significant share of global crypto liquidity and under sustained regulatory scrutiny.

What to Watch

Keep your attention on Yi He's public positioning over the coming months. As Binance pushes for renewed licensing across key jurisdictions, how its co-CEO is perceived, and how much of the old informal culture visibly remains, will directly affect institutional confidence in the platform. If you hold assets on Binance or trade BNB, the leadership identity question is not trivial. It is the exchange's biggest reputational variable right now.