Binance.US has scored a victory in its appeal of the suspension of its money-services business license in Florida. The Florida First District Court of Appeal found the emergency suspension order issued by the state Office of Financial Regulation (OFR) lacked legal justification.
The suspension of the Binance.US Florida license came in response to Binance CEO Changpeng Zhao’s guilty plea in federal court to charges of violating U.S. Anti-Money Laundering law on Nov. 21, 2023.
The appeals court cited state law that determined the OFR “may” suspend a money-services business license “by any procedure that is fair under the circumstances” if the agency provides reasons to show the decision is fair. Further, the agency did not discuss less harsh alternatives to suspension. The court found:
“The usage of ‘may’ in the statute [cited by the OFR] implies discretion, rather than obligation. Additional reasoning beyond mere reference to the statute is necessary to suspend the license.”
Further, the court found that the suspension of the Binance.US license threatened more than 170,000 state account holders with significant financial losses and tax liabilities:
“For Petitioner to immediately comply with the ESO, it would be necessary to liquidate the digital asset holdings of every customer [which] threatens financial harm because of digital asset price fluctuations.”
The decision of the appeal court is subject to appeal.
Related: CZ sentenced: A chronology of Binance’s legal battles in the US
The OFR suspended the Binance.US license a week after Zhao’s plea. It was the first of several states to do so. Binance filed an appeal of the OFR decision on March 25, but that document is not available to the public. On its website, Binance.US stated that “new user onboarding is temporarily paused” in the state.
Other states where Binance.US activity was suspended or its license renewal was denied this year include Alaska, Maine, North Carolina and Oregon. Its status in Georgia and Ohio is unclear. It never operated as a cryptocurrency exchange in Hawaii, Minnesota, New York, Texas and Vermont.
The Florida OFR did not immediately respond to a Cointelegraph request for comment on the case.
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