FCA Opens over 300 Cases against Unregistered Crypto Firms

Scams are rampant using cryptocurrencies, boiler rooms and recovery rooms.

It has started two campaigns to aware investors of scams.

Q4 2021 volumes have gone up or down and how much？

Additionally, the financial market supervisor said that it has received 16,400 inquiries between April and September last year about possible scams, a figure that is around 30 percent higher than the previous year.

In response, the regulator has opened more than 300 cases related to un-registered crypto-asset businesses, many of which are suspected to be scams. The regulator already has 50 live investigations against these crypto companies that even include criminal probes.

“Consumers need to have confidence when making investment decisions, and the data we‘ve published today shows how prevalent scams can be,” said Sarah Pritchard, FCA’s Executive Director of Markets.

Crypto Firms Are the Target

The FCA mandated all crypto companies operating in the United Kingdom register themselves with the agency. It received hundreds of requests from the crypto service providers, but the approval process turned out to be very slow. To date, only a few companies have received the approval of the British regulator.

Furthermore, the regulator said that it has stopped a quarter of applications from firms wanting to join the consumer investment market, which is a proportion that is up from 1 in 5 in the last financial year.

“Addressing the risk of harm at the authorization stage prevents firms that do not meet the FCAs minimum standards from entering the regulatory perimeter,” the regulator added. “It also helps prevent problems further down the line which may require supervision or enforcement action.”