The Financial Conduct Authority, the UK financial regulator, registered 13 crypto businesses during the 12 months ending Aug. 1, equal to 56% of the 23 applications it determined during the period, according to its latest data.
- That marks a sharp change from the regulator's record since it began supervising crypto businesses in January 2020.
- Only 68 of the 391 applications determined since then ended in registration, an approval rate of 17%.
The FCA began publicly pointing to faster crypto approvals last year after years of criticism that its registration process was too slow and restrictive.
"We have made a conscious effort to put resources into this," David Geale, the FCA's executive director for payments and digital finance, told the Financial Times in September 2025. "We have sped up our authorisations across the piece and have made some quite significant progress."
- At the time, the FCA had cut the average time required to approve a crypto registration from about 17 months to just over five months.
- Its recent approval rate had also risen to 45%, compared with less than 15% over the preceding five years.
But as The Coinformer noticed, the latest registrations show that only established businesses, rather than newcomers, received most of the successful decisions.
Established groups took nine registrations
The nine registrations went to entities associated with IG, Ripple, Blockchain.com, CEX.IO, Aave, Baillie Gifford, BNY Mellon and Robinhood.
They accounted for nearly 70% of all successful decisions during the latest 12-month period.
The registered entities were:
- IG Digital Assets.
- Ripple Markets UK.
- BC Operations.
- CEX.IO Markets UK.
- Push Labs.
- Push Virtual Assets.
- Baillie Gifford & Co.
- The Bank of New York Mellon International.
- Robinhood U.K.
BC Operations operates under the Blockchain.com brand, while Push Labs and Push Virtual Assets are both part of Aave Labs.
Aave therefore received two of the 13 registrations through separate legal entities. Both support its Push stablecoin payment and on-ramp product, meaning two successful decisions were connected to the same broader business.
Baillie Gifford and BNY Mellon also received separate registrations on June 22, the day they launched the Baillie Gifford Enhanced Yield Fund.
The fund, known as BAGEY, is issued directly on Ethereum and Solana, with BNY providing its tokenization and wallet infrastructure. The two registrations, therefore, supported different roles in the same tokenized-fund launch.
Together, the two Aave entities and the Baillie Gifford-BNY partnership mean four of the FCA's 13 successful decisions were connected to just two products.
Not clear who was turned away
The concentration doesn't establish that the FCA favors established companies, though, since the regulator doesn't identify applicants that withdraw their applications or fail to secure registration, making it impossible to compare successful firms with unsuccessful ones.
The regulator also warns that the latest 56% rate shouldn't be compared directly with applications received during the same period. Applications can take months to determine and may cross reporting windows.
The current registration only covers compliance with the UK's anti-money laundering and counterterrorist-financing rules. It's not the same as full authorization to provide regulated financial services.
- A broader regulatory regime will begin accepting applications on Sept. 30 and is scheduled to take effect on Oct. 25, 2027.
- Existing crypto registrations won't automatically convert into authorization under the new framework.