October 24, 2025
The former Binance CEO received a presidential pardon and Fidelity now lets people own the native token of Solana.
Welcome to the Meridian Update, your daily on-chain report. Who would you pardon if you were president? Let’s dive in.
“Today’s charges and guilty pleas – combined with a more than $4 billion financial penalty – sends an unmistakable message to crypto and defi companies: if you serve U.S. customers, you must obey U.S. law.”
That is what Deputy Attorney General Lisa O. Monaco said in November of 2023 as the US government announced that Binance, an exchange, and its CEO, Changpeng Zhao, pleaded guilty to a host of federal charges.
What message does Changpeng Zhao tweeting this send:
“Deeply grateful for today’s pardon and to President Trump for upholding America’s commitment to fairness, innovation, and justice.”
When asked about yesterday morning’s pardon, here is what the US President had to say:
“They said that what he did is not even a crime.”
Binance remains a large cryptocurrency exchange. The story is that Binance was known to be playing a bit faster and looser with things like know your customer (KYC) efforts and geographic restrictions than is typical of exchanges. The US government cracked down. Binance and Zhao, who many people in the on-chain world know as CZ, pleaded guilty. Zhao stepped down as CEO and served a prison sentence. The US government barred him from returning to Binance.
It’s worth noting that Binance is not a decentralized exchange. It is a centralized exchange through which people can buy on-chain assets. It is a Coinbase competitor. And it seems its formerly imprisoned CEO might make a return.
It’s hard to pinpoint exactly what all of this means for the on-chain world. It certainly was the story of the day on Crypto Twitter. Was Crypto Twitter happy? It’s hard to say. There was concern about the optics.
So why are we writing about this? To ask an important question. Will CZ appear, once again, on the UpOnly podcast? Will its new association with Coinbase, a Binance competitor, prevent him from doing so?
Fidelity lets you own Solana’s native token now
There’s something very funny about a Fidelity Learning Center blog post including the following as a “potential disadvantage” of Solana:
“Too centralized?
One criticism of Solana’s operating structure is that it may be more centralized than some of its competitors. Its validators currently number in the thousands, whereas Ethereum has over 1 million. And while its unique consensus mechanism makes Solana's processing times more efficient, it also requires more expensive hardware to run. This may make becoming a validator less accessible to many, which may in turn make it less decentralized.”
What is the something that is funny? Perhaps that Fidelity operates entirely (presumably?) on centralized exchanges.
Anyway, you can now purchase Solana on Fidelity:
“BREAKING: @Fidelity, the asset manager with $5.8 Trillion in AUM, makes SOL accessible for all US brokerage customers”
A theme of the Meridian Update and of the on-chain world in 2025 is that people want exposure to on-chain assets in off-chain ways. This lives somewhere in-between. It seems that Fidelity is letting accountholders buy actual SOL, the native token of Solana, versus an exchange-traded fund that holds SOL. But, you know, it’s a Fidelity brokerage account. Not very on-chain. In any case, new places and ways to buy on-chain assets. Something to keep an eye on.
That’s a wrap
The former Binance CEO received a presidential pardon and Fidelity now lets people own the native token of Solana. We’ll see you Monday.
Think we missed something today? Email email@meridianupdate.com.