The Financial Conduct Authority has targeted illegal finfluencers in a coordinated international enforcement week aimed at protecting consumers from harmful financial promotions.
Around 17 regulators worldwide took part in the “week of action”, which combined enforcement activity, consumer awareness campaigns and educational programmes for finfluencers seeking to operate within the rules.
Meanwhile, the FCA secured a guilty plea from Geordie Shore’s Aaron Chalmers for illegal social media promotions and has launched criminal proceedings against two other individuals for similar offences.
It also issued four targeted warning letters to individuals suspected of unauthorised financial promotions, alongside 34 warning alerts against firms or individuals and 14 updates to existing warnings.
The regulator made 120 account takedown requests to social media platforms. These accounts contained 1,267 illegal financial adverts, reaching at least 2,338,372 UK users, with 66 per cent linked to firms or individuals already on the FCA’s Warning List.
The FCA is urging social media platforms to take a more proactive role in preventing illegal financial promotions, arguing that current enforcement of their own policies is not sufficient to stop harmful content at source.
FCA executive director of enforcement and market oversight Steve Smart says: “This collective push with international partners is vital in helping to protect millions of consumers from harm. We will only make real progress in the fight against financial crime if every part of the system plays its role – including social media firms.”
