After wrapping up a four-month U.S. prison sentence in September, former Binance CEO Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao has been busy transforming Binance’s venture capital arm into a new entity known as YZi Labs. On Tuesday, YZi Labs announced its first investment: leading a $16 million funding round into a startup called Sign, a platform seeking to simplify token distribution and bring credential verification on-chain.
“Proper distribution builds trust, and verification is an essential part of it. As more people move on-chain, this is a critical part of the foundational infrastructure,” Zhao, who is known to everyone in the crypto world as “CZ”, said in an email.
Sign offers a suite of products but is best known for its service that helps distribute newly created crypto tokens in a process called airdrops, which typically involve rewarding early users of a project. The airdrop process is a later innovation that was not used by early blockchains like Bitcoin, which rely entirely on mining to distribute tokens.
The investment in Sign comes at a time when the number of token launches are exploding. As it becomes easier to launch new cryptocurrencies using AI and other tools, there are about 1 million new cryptocurrencies created each week, according to Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong.
Many of these new projects incorporate token airdrops to bolster their reputation and increase liquidity by delivering free tokens to millions of participants who fulfill certain requirements. However, they often draw scrutiny for delivering fewer tokens than promised or being overrun by scalpers using multiple accounts.
To combat this, Sign developed TokenTable, which attempts to help founders safely launch their tokens and conduct airdrops by setting clear rules and verifying the identity of each participant. CEO and co-founder Xin Yan says Sign’s revenue grew from $1.7 million in 2023 to $15 million in 2024 because of the growing popularity of token airdrops on the TON blockchain.
“TON really boosted us because it has so many users. They have so many tokens and the tokens have so many recipients so large-scale AirDrops became the norm,” Yan said.
Yan says Sign will use the money raised in this round to expand globally and help governments adopt blockchain technology by implementing on-chain identity verification.
Other backers that joined in the The Sign funding round include Altos Ventures, HackVC and Amber Ventures.
YZi Labs describes itself as “a venture capital and incubator firm dedicated to fostering innovation and supporting investments across various sectors,” though Bloomberg, citing a YZi Labs employee, has referred to the venture as a family office.
YZi Labs currently manages $10 billion worth of crypto-related assets amassed when it was known as Binance Labs. Since his release, Zhao said he has been focused on investing in AI, biotech and blockchain companies—and Sign represents his first step back into the crypto game.
Zhao was released from a California prison last September after serving four months for failing to implement proper anti-money laundering protocols at Binance, the largest global crypto exchange that he founded in 2017. Despite his stint in prison, Zhao ranks number 24 on the list of the world’s richest people with an estimated net worth of around $60 billion.
