According to a Dec. 16 announcement, this will allow the companies to continue trading for an extended period until July 09, 2021, following the initial registration deadline of Jan. 10, 2021.
According to Cointelegraph, the FCA became the supervisor of Anti-Money Laundering and Counter Terrorist Financing measures for crypto firms in the United Kingdom on Jan. 10, 2020.
As of this date, all such companies have had to comply with AML regulations, with a requirement that they be registered by Jan. 10, 2021. Nevertheless, due to issues with site visits during the pandemic and what it describes as “the complexity and standard of the applications received,” the FCA has so far not been able to process all of the applications.
It has therefore issued temporary registrations to all businesses that submitted an application before Dec. 16, providing an additional six months to process them. The extension only applies to firms that were doing business prior to Jan. 10, 2020, while any new company will require a full registration. Sergey Zhdanov, chief operating officer of Exmo, stated:
“We have some experience in getting an AEMI license (electronic money institution). It’s not exactly a piece of cake, but during that process the FCA tells you what is wrong or right and what you need to improve to get the license. Here we didn’t have that luck.”
The FCA is warning all customers of crypto asset firms to check whether the firm is on the register, has temporary registration or can continue to trade due to being registered in a different country.
Any company not falling into one of these categories will be operating illegally if it continues to trade after Jan. 10, 2021, so customers are advised to withdraw both crypto assets and money from such businesses before this date.
