FX Revenues

FX Revenues, CySEC and FCA Bans, Finalto Sale, SEC on BTC: Editors Pick

ICYMI: the biggest news stories of the week.

As the first week in August draws to a close, lets take a look back at the news stories that dominated the worlds of forex, fintech and crypto in our best of the week segment.

Active Bitcoin Addresses Increase 30%

Bitcoin, the worlds most valuable digital currency, saw a surge in its network activity on Monday morning as the total number of active Bitcoin addresses jumped by nearly 30%.

Active Bitcoin entities per day increased from 250,000 to approximately 325,000 over the last seven days as Bitcoin touched a high of $42,500.

Google Allows Crypto Ads Again in US, Blacklists ICOs and DeFi

Google has updated its advertising policy for financial products and services, allowing marketers to run cryptocurrency advertisements again, effective from Tuesday. But, the search-engine giant is putting heavy restrictions on the advertisements related to cryptocurrencies.

The ads targeted to the United States-based consumers must be of regulated crypto companies, meaning they must be registered with the ‘FinCEN as a Money Services Business and with at least one state as a money transmitter’ or should be a federal or state-chartered bank entity.

Trading 212 Receives £13.75 Million in Fresh Cash Injection

Trading 212 UK Limited, which is an FCA-regulated online broker, has raised £13.75 million in capital with the allotment of new company shares.

According to the latest Companies House filing, the broker has issued and allotted a total of 13,750,000 shares on July 27 at a nominal value of £1. Additionally, the company highlighted that all of the newly issued shares have been allotted in exchange for cash.

FCA Suspends BDSwiss from Offering CFDs in UK, the Group Responds

The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has suspended Cypriot-based broker BDSwiss Holding Plc and all other entities under the BDSwiss Group from offering contracts for differences (CFDs) to UK investors.

Announced on Thursday, the financial markets regulator, alleged that although one of the BDSwiss subsidiaries is regulated in the United Kingdom, the group has onboarded a great number of UK investors through overseas entities.

The broker has been ordered to stop its services in the UK and close all trading positions and return the money to customers.

Kapital Investment Group Acquires Turkish Broker Isik Menkul

Kapital Investment Group (KIG BV), a part of the international financial services provider, Global Kapital Group (GKG), announced today that it has acquired Isik Menkul, a leading multi-asset broker in Turkey.

The broker has a strong presence in the Turkish region and offers trading services in a broad range of regulated financial products including FX, commodities, CFDs, futures and stocks.

CySEC Suspends License of Libertex.com Operator Indication Investments

The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) has partially suspended the Cyprus Investment Firm (CIF) license of Indication Investments Ltd, the operator of the FX and CFDs broker, Libertex.com.

The regulatory decision for the suspension was made on August 3 for multiple alleged violations of mandatory compliances.

According to Tuesday‘s notice, the Cypriot regulator found possible lapses on the broker’s part in complying with the regulatory framework on the restriction on the marketing, distribution and sale of CFDs to retail clients. There might be additional lapses in the company‘s organizational requirements and the offerings of investment services, ’in accordance with the best interests of the clients.

Playtech Releases Recommendation for Finalto Sale

The Finalto drama continued. Playtech published the supplementary circular to shareholders today and notified that the adjourned General Meeting to approve the Disposal of Finalto will be resumed at 10 am on 18 August 2021.

In the latest announcement made on Monday, Playtech mentioned that the recently received proposal from Gopher Investments is uncertain in terms of deliverability.

The company added that one of the primary reasons behind the uncertainty of Gophers proposal is that it remained subject to a number of conditions.