Securities Commissions Targets OTC and Virtual Asset Trading Platform BitPrime

Securities Commissions Targets OTC and Virtual Asset Trading Platform BitPrime

Securities Commissions Targets OTC and Virtual Asset Trading Platform BitPrime

Regulators Take Action Against Bitprime Ltd For Onboarding Users Without Local Licensing.

What Happened?

February 20, 2020: The BCSC identified that due to an inadequate KYC & AML program, Bitprime Ltd was onboarding clients they were not allowed to serve. BitPrime operates a platform that offers the retail trading of cryptocurrency assets.

Source: https://www.bcsc.bc.ca/Enforcement/Investment_Caution_List/Bitprime_Ltd__dba_Bitprimeprofx/

Who Is Impacted?

Fintech platforms, wealth managers, VASPs, and financial service providers who are serving users, clients, or investors in more than one jurisdiction.

Why This Matters?

Many online financial services businesses who have acquired licensing in a single jurisdiction believe that their license means they can serve the world.

This regulatory action shows that the BCSC, along with other IOSC (International Organization of Securities Commissions) members – which includes the U.S., the EU, Canada, Australia, and others – have a very different opinion on the matter.

The reality is, you can only serve the jurisdictions where you have both a license to operate in and a compliance program in place capable of meeting the local regulations of your user.

What’s Next?

BitPrime’s actions have placed the company on several international watchlists and adverse media lists. Companies and virtual asset traders who do business with BitPrime may now be subject to increased regulatory scrutiny, and they are likely to start showing up in the more sophisticated blockchain forensics tools.

To avoid this situation, BitPrime could have used a digital onboarding tool that had the capability to identify the prospective user’s jurisdiction, preventing those user accounts from being created.

While this is a relatively simple gap to close, most fintech platforms do not understand how vital it is to screen for this type of risk.

In order to avoid these regulatory actions, fintech platforms should test their compliance systems to ensure their onboarding tools can reject a user based on jurisdiction. Furthermore, these tools should be smart enough to identify and reject these users without incurring the full cost of KYC.

Executives should ensure their compliance teams are saving time and money by not wasting resources through onboarding and screening clients that the business is not able to serve.

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Paris FinTech Forum 2020: Highlights and Takeaways

Paris FinTech Forum 2020: Highlights and Takeaways

Paris FinTech Forum 2020: Highlights and Takeaways

This month, iComply attended the Paris FinTech Forum 2020 with Toronto Finance International to represent Canada alongside four other innovative companies driving digital transformation in global finance. The Paris FinTech Forum 2020 (or PFF2020) hosted many of the world’s best fintech, regtech, insurtech, and financial institutions, with a focus on the evolving European ecosystem.

The event itself was two days long, packed to the brim from 7:30 AM to 9:30 PM both days with speakers, panels, workshops, networking lounges, company demo booths, and much more.

Our head of operations, Ash Viens, presented on Stage 7 to an audience keen to learn about how iComply is driving down the cost of AML compliance in key markets such as Europe, North America, and Asia. iComply’s unique value in this market is helping compliance teams to streamline and automate many of their back-office tasks, saving thousands in compliance costs annually and multiplying the effective output of their team.

Our team also held meetings with several key European banking and lending leaders, including Credit Agricole and BNP Paribas, to demonstrate how we’re helping companies automate user validation, identity verification, document authentication, AML and CTF risk screening, and ongoing monitoring across multiple jurisdictions in real-time. These firms were most impressed with how cost-effective, robust, and easy to implement iComply was compared to other solutions they have seen previously.

When you consider the impacts of Brexit, AMLD5, the FATF Travel Rule, and new digital identity regulations being implemented worldwide, many companies struggle to maintain their compliance operations and most fall back to manual workflows. Some brands are facing the reality of losing their license altogether while others, such as Revolut have had to leave Tier 1 financial markets like the UK and seek licensing in jurisdictions with lower compliance burden and oversight.

All in all, we were thrilled to be invited by TFI to participate in this year’s Paris FinTech Forum 2020, which gave our team valuable insights and relationships in the European ecosystem.

To learn more about how iComply can save you time and money on your AML compliance requirements, click below to connect with a member of our team.

2020 Paris Fintech Forum: iComply and Toronto Finance International

2020 Paris Fintech Forum: iComply and Toronto Finance International

2020 Paris Fintech Forum: iComply and Toronto Finance International

With the first few weeks of 2020 already behind us, our global calendar of events and conferences is filling up quickly!

Our team has been invited to join the Canadian delegation along with Toronto Finance International at what is considered one of the largest and most exclusive fintech events in the world.

iComply Investor Services will be heading to the Paris FinTech Forum from January 28th – 29th, as well as attending several trade meetings scheduled in the days leading up to, during, and following the event.

Hosted in the historical Paris stock exchange building Palais Brongniart, the 2020 Paris Fintech Forum brings together over 2,600 attendees from more than 70 countries worldwide, featuring more than 160 global fintech companies and nearly 300 speakers.

If you and your team plan on attending the Paris Fintech Forum this January, our team would love to connect with you! We will be available to meet throughout the Forum to discuss how we are helping fintech and digital finance companies across the globe.

To connect, secure a time slot in our calendar here.

Which speakers are you most excited to see and which companies are you most eager to meet at the Paris Fintech Forum? We want to hear your thoughts on what motivated you to attend, and what your partnership goals are for 2020!

2019 Toronto Refinitiv Summit: Event Highlights and Takeaways

2019 Toronto Refinitiv Summit: Event Highlights and Takeaways

2019 Toronto Refinitiv Summit: Event Highlights and Takeaways

iComply kicked this month of December off with a bang by attending the fully-packed 2019 Refinitiv Summit at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Downtown Toronto.

Regulators, global financial leaders, and industry professionals alike were amongst the ranks of prestigious attendees that flew in to learn from a wide assortment of keynote speakers, covering topics ranging from regulatory challenges to new digital asset classes, and everything in between.

Strong audience participation was apparent throughout, as the event organizers provided us with an app to submit questions directly to speakers in real-time about their presentations.

The Summit was centralized around industry engagement and it was reflected in the activities during the day…with the voices of inspired collaboration echoing throughout the halls of the venue.

Outside of listening to the keynote presentations, we connected with brokers, corporate service providers, and fund managers during the networking hours—all of whom were eager to engage and develop cohesive strategies to make the biggest impact heading into 2020.

With so many new and updated standards for our industry coming into effect, we feel strongly that the time to be nimble and adaptive to market shifts is now.

If you saw us there but did not get the chance to speak with us, we would still love to hear from you. Visit our website or send a request via email to Andrew Weiner at [email protected] (Head of Partnerships) or Shane Sibley at [email protected] (Head of Sales). Our team is looking forward to connecting with you.

Canada FinTech Forum 2019: Event Highlights and Takeaways

Canada FinTech Forum 2019: Event Highlights and Takeaways

Canada FinTech Forum 2019: Event Highlights and Takeaways

This October, iComply was privileged to join the international delegation that attended the seventh annual Canada FinTech Forum in Montreal, Canada.

Alongside our partners and colleagues at the Luxembourg House of Financial Technology (LHoFT), we were graciously hosted by National Bank, Manulife, Deloitte, and ATB Financial during our tour of the city’s leaders in fintech innovation.

In addition to visiting and connecting with various team leaders at some of the country’s largest institutions, iComply spent 3 days networking at the Forum itself. 2019 marked the seventh year in a row that the Canada FinTech Forum was the highest-attended fintech event in the country.

Reflecting on the keynote presentations, guest speakers, and conversations we found ourselves in throughout the week, one major theme underpinned the whole conference: collaboration.

Navigating the sea of FinTech Forum attendees all around us, this was readily apparent, as teams eagerly exchanged contact details to fall in sync with as many of the major, influential players that could help them get to the next level of scale in their business model as possible.

As the boundaries of our industry expand through digital applications that cross into new markets, companies are facing increasingly complex jurisdictional compliance hurdles that can only be overcome in one of two ways:

1. become the expert, or
2. find a partner who is.

iComply has always believed in the strength of the network effect, and we would like to invite anyone who saw us at the event, or who is currently seeking the right compliance partner, to contact us. You can reach out to our team through our website, www.iComplyKYC.com.