City watchdog tells banks to treat small businesses ‘fairly’ during cost-of-living crunch July 12, 2022 The UK’s financial watchdog has told Britain’s top banks to improve their treatment of struggling small business owners when collecting and recovering debts. The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said Britain’s banks should take action to ensure fair treatment of small and medium enterprise (SME) customers, after the watchdog uncovered repeated instances of failures during [...]
Top Hong Kong official to take over as FCA chair July 8, 2022 The Financial Conduct Authority has announced today that one of Hong Kong’s top financial officials will take over as chair of the watchdog next year.
FCA warns Brits to seek help as soon as possible over financial troubles July 6, 2022 The financial regulator has urged Brits to seek help as soon as possible if they are facing financial difficulties amid the spiralling cost of household bills. Research has suggested that many borrowers are missing out on available support, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said on Wednesday. Half of those borrowers in financial difficulty who waited [...]
FCA brings in six directors and hires ‘almost 500’ to meet expanding remit July 5, 2022 The City watchdog said today it had bolstered its senior leadership team and hired almost 500 people in the past six months as it races to keep up with a rapidly expanding remit.
FCA temporarily suspends oil and gas firm Pennpetro after it misses deadline for annual results July 1, 2022 Britain’s financial watchdog has temporarily suspended a Texas-based oil and gas firm’s securities after a delay in publishing annual results. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) took action against the London-listed Pennpetro Energy this week at the request of the company. This comes after a delay in the firm’s publishing of its annual report for 2021, [...]
Subprime lender Amigo Loans launches new loan product after learning from ‘mistakes of the past’ June 28, 2022 Payday lender Amigo Loans has said it has “learnt the lesson from the past” ahead of the launch of a new guarantor loan product for “underserved” customers. The Bournemouth firm is set to offer customers two new loan products after it was blocked from trading by the UK’s financial watchdog in March 2020. The new [...]
Wise profit leaps as news of fintech chief’s FCA tax probe settles June 28, 2022 Fintech giant Wise today revealed profits hit £371.9m last year on the back of a surge in revenues and customer growth. The London-listed fintech said gross profit rose 43 per cent on 2021 levels while revenues topped £559.9m, up a third on last year. Customer numbers meanwhile hit 4.6m in the last quarter of 2022 [...]
FCA laments the high number of financial crime ‘red flags’ missed by crypto firms June 27, 2022 The Financial Conduct Authority said many crypto firms that have applied to register under money laundering regulations miss financial crime “red flags” and have inadequate controls. A spokesperson for the FCA said to City A.M.: “We have seen too many financial crime red flags missed by the cryptoasset businesses seeking registration.” Some firms do not [...]
Shock in fintech sector: City watchdog FCA launches tax evasion probe into billionaire founder of Wise June 27, 2022 The money transfer giant Wise revealed this morning that the FCA has launched a probe into its billionaire co-founder and chief executive over his status as a so-called deliberate tax defaulter. Wise said the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has launched an inquiry into Kristo Kaarmann’s “regulatory obligations and standards”. It comes after Kaarmann was named [...]
City watchdog hits Ghana International Bank with £5.8m fine over money laundering failures June 23, 2022 The UK’s financial watchdog has fined Ghana International Bank £5.8m over its poor anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing control measures. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) fined the London bank over its failure to carry out proper checks for money laundering. The watchdog said that while there is no evidence any money laundering actually took place, [...]