Officers from the Financial Conduct Authority, HMRC and the South West Regional Organised Crime Unit issued cease-and-desist notices and gathered evidence that is now feeding into criminal investigations.
The Financial Conduct Authority raided eight London premises on 22 April in what it described as the first coordinated enforcement action against illegal peer-to-peer cryptocurrency trading in the United Kingdom.
The operation brought together the FCA, His Majesty's Revenue & Customs and the South West Regional Organised Crime Unit — an unusual combination that signals the regulator views unregistered P2P crypto operations not merely as compliance failures but as potential conduits for money laundering and tax evasion. Officers issued cease-and-desist notices at each site and collected evidence that the FCA said is now feeding into several criminal investigations.
The FCA has not named the individuals or businesses targeted. It has not said when charges, if any, will be filed. What it has said is that every one of the eight sites was facilitating peer-to-peer crypto transactions without the FCA registration required under UK anti-money laundering regulations — and without the know-your-customer controls that registration demands.
That last point is the crux of the matter. Under British law, anyone facilitating cryptocurrency exchange or transfer services must register with the FCA and implement AML controls. The bar for registration is not trivial; the FCA rejected or saw withdrawals from the vast majority of firms that applied when the regime took effect in 2020. As of April 2026, no registered peer-to-peer crypto trading platform operates in the UK. Every P2P operator in the country is, by definition, unregistered — and therefore illegal.
The sweep did not target the kind of casual bitcoin trading that happens between friends or on messaging apps. The eight premises appear to have been semi-professional operations — physical locations where traders facilitated crypto-to-fiat and fiat-to-crypto conversions at scale. Think of them as the crypto equivalent of unlicensed bureaux de change: cash in, crypto out, no questions asked.
That model thrives in regulatory gaps. The UK's current crypto rules cover only anti-money laundering; they don't extend to broader market conduct, consumer protection or prudential requirements. A comprehensive regulatory framework is in development, with a licensing window expected to open in September 2026 and the full regime taking effect by October 2027. Until then, the FCA's enforcement powers are limited to AML registration — which is precisely the tool it wielded on 22 April.
The involvement of HMRC is telling. Unregistered P2P trading operations that handle cash are a natural vector for tax fraud; transactions conducted without KYC controls leave no paper trail for revenue authorities to follow. The South West Regional Organised Crime Unit's participation adds another dimension, suggesting that at least some of the sites may have links to organised criminal networks that use peer-to-peer crypto trading to launder proceeds.
Britain's approach to crypto regulation has been characterised by a peculiar tension: ambitious long-term plans coupled with minimal short-term enforcement. The government has committed to building one of the world's most comprehensive crypto regulatory regimes, but in the meantime, illegal operations have had relatively free rein. The 22 April raids are the clearest signal yet that the FCA intends to use what authority it has, even if the broader framework is still years from completion.
The raids also carry a message for the wider industry. The FCA's ban on crypto derivatives sales to retail investors, implemented in 2021, was widely viewed as heavy-handed. The P2P crackdown is harder to criticise: these were unregistered, unregulated operations handling cash without AML controls. If Britain is to build a credible crypto regulatory regime, it has to demonstrate that existing rules are enforced — not just drafted.
The FCA has said it will continue monitoring for unregistered crypto activity. For now, eight London operators have learned that the absence of a comprehensive regulatory framework does not mean the absence of consequences.
