FCA Targets Three More London Sites Over Unregistered P2P Crypto Trading

In brief

• The FCA, HMRC and the Metropolitan Police visited three London premises on September 10.
• Cease and desist letters were issued at all three, ordering suspected illegal businesses to stop.
• The FCA says no peer-to-peer crypto business is registered with it anywhere in Britain.

The UK's Financial Conduct Authority has run a second round of operations against peer-to-peer crypto traders in London, issuing cease and desist letters at three premises alongside HM Revenue & Customs and the Metropolitan Police.

The action took place on September 10 under the 2017 money laundering regulations, and follows a first sweep in April whose evidence the FCA says is now supporting criminal investigations.

Anyone buying and selling crypto directly with others as a business in the UK must be registered, and, the FCA said, there are currently no registered peer-to-peer crypto businesses operating in the UK.

Every such operation in the country is therefore unregistered by definition, a position that makes enforcement a question of finding them rather than distinguishing the compliant from the rest.

FCA vs P2P

Unregistered traders sit outside the anti-money laundering controls registration would impose, the FCA said, which makes them a route for moving and laundering criminal funds.