Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, or CZ, said most of his personal assets remain in cryptocurrencies and described a personal finance approach built around what he called four things he does not do: buy stocks, speculate on property, trade crypto short term, or hold too much cash.
Zhao made the remarks in an interview with Hong Kong 01 while attending Bitcoin Asia 2026 in Hong Kong, according to BlockBeats on Sept. 1. In the interview, he looked back on his personal history, his investment thinking, and how he now allocates capital.
CZ revisits his early career and business path
Zhao said he was born in rural Jiangsu and moved to Canada at age 12. He worked at McDonald's and a gas station in Vancouver before studying computer science at McGill University. He later worked in financial technology in both Tokyo and New York.
By age 25, Zhao said, he was leading a team of about 60 people at Bloomberg and earning an annual salary of $390,000. In 2005, he moved to Shanghai to start a fintech company. After running the business for eight years, he left with his equity stake reduced to zero.
Zhao said he encountered Bitcoin in 2013, sold his Shanghai property, and put the money into BTC. After that purchase, the price fell by about two-thirds and then traded sideways for roughly a year and a half.
In 2017, he founded Binance and raised $15 million through an initial coin offering. The platform token fell 40% on its first day of trading, but Binance became the world's largest cryptocurrency exchange by trading volume about five months after it was founded.
How Zhao defines his "four don'ts"
Zhao said the bulk of his personal wealth is still in crypto. His "four don'ts" are not buying stocks, not speculating on real estate, not trading crypto in the short term, and not keeping excessive cash positions.
He said "not trading crypto" does not mean refusing to hold digital assets. Instead, he was referring to avoiding short-term trading. His main strategy is to hold for the long term and sell only small amounts when he needs to spend.
On real estate, Zhao said buying, transferring, and selling property takes too much time, and that the time cost is not worth it. On stocks, he said that given the size of his assets, holding a small stock allocation has limited significance.
He also described holding fiat currency as "the dumbest investment method," saying cash keeps losing value. Because of that, he said he only keeps enough money for daily needs and converts assets when spending is required.
Decision-making framework and YZiLabs activity
Zhao also shared the framework he uses for decisions. He said decisions with large impact and no easy reversal should be slowed down, while decisions with smaller impact and clear reversibility can be made quickly and adjusted over time.
He added that he is now mainly investing in early-stage projects through YZiLabs and continues to deploy capital during market downturns. Over the past six months, YZiLabs has invested in nearly 200 projects, with about 80% focused on Web3 and 20% on AI.
Zhao said those investments could generate better returns over the next one to two years.