Binance, one of the leading cryptocurrency exchanges, has responded to a UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) notice that barriers Binance Markets Ltd. from operating in the country.
On June 25, FCA issued a notice ordering Binance to stop all regulated activities in Britain and imposed stringent requirements. The notice reads:
“The Firm must not, without the prior written consent of the FCA, carry out any regulated activities for which it has Part 4A permission with immediate effect.”
The FCA also asked Binance to display a notice on its website and other communication channels that should read:
“BINANCE MARKETS LIMITED IS NOT PERMITTED TO UNDERTAKE ANY REGULATED ACTIVITY IN THE UK. Due to the imposition of requirements by the FCA, Binance Markets Limited is not currently permitted to undertake any regulated activities without the prior written consent of the FCA. (No other entity in the Binance Group holds any form of UK authorisation, registration or license to conduct regulated activity in the UK).”
The exchange has all to remove advertising and financial promotions targeting the UK. Binance Markets has until the evening of June 30 to confirm that it has carried out the instruction.
In response, Binance said that the notice did not affect the main crypto services offered through Binance.com as Binance Markets Ltd. (BML) “is a separate legal entity and does not offer any products or services via the http://Binance.com website.”
According to the exchange, Binance Group acquired in May 2020 but it is not yet operational in the UK and used its FCA regulatory permissions. The exchange said:
“The FCA UK notice has no direct impact on the services provided on http://Binance.com.
Our relationship with our users has not changed.”
With this FCA ban, Binance Markets Limited will not be able to offer derivatives in the UK. As BML was not operational, this seems that Binance was offering UK customers products and services via Binance.com.
According to some sources, BML applied to become a registered cryptocurrency company with the FCA but pulled that application last month.
But this is not the first instance that blames Binance for operating without any regulatory permission. The FCA also issued a similar notice about Binance in 2018. Most recently, the Japanese FSA has also warned that that cryptocurrency exchange Binance is operating in the country without permission. In response, Binance said that It did not hold any crypto exchange operation in Japan.
If you found this article interesting, here you can find more Blockchain and cryptocurrency news
