Binance Buys Majority Stake in Indonesia’s Tokocrypto, Lays off 58% Of Workforce

Global cryptocurrency exchange Binance announced that it has become the majority shareholder in Indonesia’s crypto assets digital exchange Tokocrypto. Details of the transaction was not disclosed.

Tokocrypto is the first crypto exchange in Indonesia to be registered under the Trade and Futures Exchange Ministry (BAPPEBTI).

News of the acquisition was confirmed by Binance’s CEO and Co-founder Changpeng Zhao (CZ) in a tweet yesterday saying that they had always been a shareholder in the firm.

This deal merely served to “inject more cash and increase its shareholding” in Tokocrypto.

Binance was the majority shareholder of Toko from the beginning. Just injected more cash and increased our shareholding a bit. pic.twitter.com/NIeYYxzPdU

— CZ 🔶 Binance (@cz_binance) December 19, 2022

Binance, which had invested in the Indonesian crypto exchange in 2020 and 2021, said that it will “gradually grow its investment in Tokocrypto to nearly 100%”.

Pang Xue Kai will be stepping down as Tokocrypto’s CEO but he will still remain on the board of commissioners. He will be replaced by Yudhono Rawis who will serve as the interim CEO during the acquisition process.

The acquisition also saw Tokocrypto conducting mass layoffs with approximately 58% of its workforce being let go.

Moving forward, business unit operations and activities other than exchanges will be temporarily discontinued but no specific timeline was given for this.

The firm said in a statement,

“Tokocrypto made the choice to streamline operations and focus on improving the functioning of the crypto asset trading platform in response to altering crypto market conditions.”

Binance has snapped up stakes in several licensed crypto firms in Asia Pacific to ease its entry into those markets.

The crypto firm had acquired an 18% stake in Singapore’s Hg Exchange, invested an undisclosed sum in Malaysia-based MX Global and bought over Japanese crypto exchange service provider Sakura Exchange BitCoin.

Binance has had run-ins with regulators from Singapore, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, the UK and Thailand in the past for operating without the requisite licenses in these jurisdictions.