Well we knew SBF was a criminal as soon as his claimed bankruptcy last November. But nobody would of expected CZ to actually be charged with all this.
His exchange was actually fairly honest and never scammed or defrauded individuals. This is why it was a shock to many and many are saying is was blackrock that claimed this needs to happen for the bitcoin etf to get approved. Binance just was way too big and they want the market share to separate.
Well, saying that nobody was expecting that is a bit wrong. There was a lot of FUD around Binance and CZ. People suggested that they don't have all BTC that they claim to have, and were suspecting some other shady stuff. I'm not saying that it's true, but there were some suspicions that's for sure.