Binance, OKX to comply with new financial promotion regulations in the UK

Major international cryptocurrency exchanges such as Binance and OKX have announced that they are working to comply with new financial promotion regulations in the UK.

The UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) launched the country's new Financial Promotions (FinProm) system on October 8, aiming to ensure fair, clean and transparent crypto promotions for cryptocurrency companies.

Binance announced on October 6th that it has launched a new domain for UK users and has partnered with local peer-to-peer lending platform Rebuildingsociety.

As part of the compliance update, Binance's UK retail users will be redirected to a local domain from October 8, which will only display Binance products and services that are authorized to comply with UK regulations. Such products include spot and margin trading, Binance Pay, nonfungible token (NFT) marketplace, lending and more.

However, in compliance with the new FCA rules, Binance will stop offering products such as gift cards, referral bonuses, gift cards, academia and research, the announcement notes.

The changes will only apply to retail users in the UK and will not affect users exempted by the new FinProm rules, including certain institutional and professional investors.

OKX also made a statement on October 6 in honor of FinProm. The exchange says it has reduced its token offering to about 40 assets and adopted eye-catching risk warnings on its interface. One such warning is located at the top of OKX's homepage and invites investors to take a few minutes to learn more about the risks of crypto investing. The warning says:

“Don't invest unless you are prepared to lose all your money. This is a high-risk investment and you should not expect to be protected if something goes wrong.

In addition, OKX has launched a standalone UK account on X (formerly Twitter). The company has pledged to mention products and services that comply with the new UK rules on its social media page.

Crypto payment service MoonPay is another industry firm that has been working to comply with the new FinProm regulations. According to MoonPay Deputy General Counsel Matt Sullivan, one of the biggest challenges of ensuring compliance is related to conducting international business.

Related: UK FCA issues ‘final warning' to unregistered crypto companies regarding compliance with notification regime

“The challenge will be to make sure we meet all these new requirements in the UK while working around the world,” Sullivan told Cointelegraph in a statement.

“Ensuring compliance with FinProm regulations requires environmental product improvements, the implementation of new procedures and policies, as well as education within the company. […] There may be some ‘settling in' time and initial impressions of the application of some rules may change over time.”

Some crypto companies have been struggling to comply with the new promotion regulations in the UK. Major crypto exchanges such as KuCoin and HTX (formerly Huobi) may be promoting their services without a license, according to the FCA's October 8 disclosures. The firms are listed among 143 entities defined as “unauthorized firms” that are not allowed to operate in the UK.

A total of 143 new entities were added to the alert list, including major exchanges such as Huobi-owned HTX and KuCoin. The warning list doesn't show much other than the statement, “You should avoid dealing with this company.”