Billion-dollar regulatory fines fail to dent Big Tech January 29, 2026 For the world’s biggest tech firms, regulatory penalties are no longer a consequential financial event. Alphabet, Apple, Meta and Amazon were fined a combined $7.8bn (£6.2bn) in 2025 for breaches of competition and privacy rules, according to a new Proton report. And while that sounds like a hefty number, in practice, it would have taken [...]
HSBC to cough up £230m over dividend tax-fraud claims January 8, 2026 European banking juggernaut HSBC is set to cough up nearly £230m to settle an investigation relating to tax-fraud claims. The FTSE 100 titan was accused of helping foreign investors evade taxes on dividends through a sophisticated financial manoeuvre known as ‘cum-cum’ trading. This relates to a series of transactions between 2014 and 2019, which were [...]
City watchdog fines ex-Carillion finance chiefs for market manipulation January 7, 2026 The City watchdog has fined the former finance directors of collapsed construction firm Carillion for their role in making “misleading” statements from the company. The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said both Richard Adam and Zafar Khan were aware of “serious financial troubles” in Carillion’s UK business but failed to reflect this in company announcements. Adam [...]
Nationwide hit with fine after failing to flag Covid furlough fraud December 12, 2025 Nationwide had been slapped with a £44m fine by the City watchdog for failures in its financial crime controls. The building society giant has been blasted by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for missing opportunities to identify fraudulent Covid furlough payments. The FCA said one customer received 24 payments, totalling north of £27m, over 13 [...]
Virgin Media slapped with £24m Ofcom fine December 1, 2025 Ofcom has dished out its biggest fine of the year after accusing telecoms giant Virgin Media of failing to protect vulnerable customers. The media regulator has hit Virgin Media with a £23.8m fine over its treatment of customers during a planned transition from analogue to digital landlines. Virgin Media notified Ofcom over incidents connected with [...]
Starmer reprimands Reeves for ‘inadvertent failure’ over rental licence mishap October 30, 2025 Sir Keir Starmer has sent a sharply worded email to Rachel Reeves criticising the Chancellor for misleading suggestions that she did not know she needed a licence to rent out her family home. Reeves has had to backtrack from earlier suggestions that she and her husband had not been aware of the Southwark Council rental [...]
Royal Mail slapped with £21m Ofcom fine for late deliveries October 15, 2025 Royal Mail has once again been hit with a huge fine for failing to meet its delivery targets. Regulator Ofcom has handed Britain’s postal service a £21m fine after only 77 per cent of first class and 92.5 per cent of second class mail was delivered on time, well short of the 93 per cent [...]
ICO fines Capita £14m after millions affected by data breach October 15, 2025 Capita has been fined £14m by the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) after millions were affected by its data breach. The fine follows a cyber attack in 2023 in which the personal information of 6.6m people was stolen, from pension records and staff records to the details of customers of organisations Capita supports. For some, this [...]
Motor finance: ‘Nothing is certain’ as banks await historic ruling July 30, 2025 The Supreme Court will hand down what could be the “most consequential ruling for lenders” in recent history on Friday in the dramatic culmination of the motor finance saga. In a twist, the highest court in the land surprised the market last Friday evening after updating its system with the information that it will announce [...]
Asda faces another hefty fine for selling expired food in stores July 16, 2025 Supermarket giant Asda has been given a huge fine for selling expired food in two stores, its second such fine in three months. Repeated checks by Trading Standards officers discovered expired items contrary to food safety codes at its Leckwith and Pentwyn branches in Cardiff. The TDR-owned grocer was then fined £640,000 for selling 115 [...]