Today, I wanted to tell you about one fun fact… Recently licensed FinTech companies are typically super excited, they prepare their PR statements and go on a roadshow to announce their license approval to the world. In 100% of the cases I know of, they say something inaccurate or politically incorrect in these media publications and interviews, which triggers a letter from their regulators with an official “warning”. ⚠️

Good news – it happens so often that it’s almost a part of the program, so don’t get scared. Bad news – I have seen so many of these letters and I typically review all the press releases before they go out, and I still cannot predict what the regulatory team is not going to like this time around.

What are the most common mistakes that may lead to a “warning letter”: 📩

• Calling yourself a “regulated exchange” (because most cryptocurrency marketplaces are not regulated as an exchange within the meaning it has in the financial industry.
• Calling your “VASP” registration a “license” – again, a legalistic issue, but regulators are very particular about it.
• Inflating the scope of what you can do with this license in terms of the scope of services and geography, for example, suggesting that “this license brings us closer to our mission of democratising access to financing and investment opportunities worldwide”.

Well, in some cases regulators may not like something totally innocent, such as the expressions “we worked closely with the regulatory team” or “we are grateful for the ongoing support of our regulators”, but you simply cannot predict all these nuances. 🤦🏼

So, what do you do?

Send an email to the regulators, say that you are taking this very seriously, apologize and promise to be more careful in the future. If the content is on your website under your control, make corrections, if the content is published by journalists who interviewed you (assuming the mistakes are innocent and not factually misleading), do nothing, because it’s not your platform. Most of the time this will solve the issue.

Any questions? Fire away! 🔥