CFI Cyprus Settles with CySEC, Pays €150K for Possible Non-Compliance

The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) has reached a €150,000 settlement with the forex and CFDs broker, Credit Financier Invest (CFI) Limited for possible violation of compliance around preventing money laundering Money Laundering Money laundering is a blanket term to describe the process by which criminals disguise the original ownership and proceeds of criminal conduct by making such proceeds appear to be derived from a legitimate source.Money laundering is an issue that traverses countless industries and sectors, which includes the financial services space. Though criminal money may be successfully laundered without the assistance of the financial sector, billions of dollars’ worth of criminally derived money are laund Money laundering is a blanket term to describe the process by which criminals disguise the original ownership and proceeds of criminal conduct by making such proceeds appear to be derived from a legitimate source.Money laundering is an issue that traverses countless industries and sectors, which includes the financial services space. Though criminal money may be successfully laundered without the assistance of the financial sector, billions of dollars’ worth of criminally derived money are laund Read this Term and terror financing.

Though publicly announced on Tuesday, the Cypriot regulator took the decision in early May. The company has already settled with the regulator, paying the amount with an understanding that “some of CFI processes are now enhanced.”

CFI is a multi-regulated brokerage platform. Apart from Cyprus, it is licensed in the United Kingdom, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Lebanon and Mauritius. The settlement with the Cypriot financial market watchdog was only made for the Cypriot entity of the CFI Group.

The regulatory announcement detailed that the broker had possibly violated three specific violations of compliance. These are laws around the application of adequate and appropriate procedures concerning customer identification and customer due diligence, the detailed examination of each transaction which by its nature may be considered to be particularly vulnerable to be associated with money laundering offenses or terrorist financing, and informing the Company’s employees about the systems and procedures that the Company follows.

Elie Aoun, the CEO of CFI Cyprus, told Finance Magnates that these are “issues pertaining to some procedural and administrative matters.”

“CFI is happy with the closure of this matter and looks forward to working even more closely with the regulator. We would like to further clarify that this settlement concerns our CFI Cyprus entity only,” he added.

More Actions

In another regulatory action, the Cypriot supervisor withdrew the Cyprus Investment Firm (CIF) license of SPA Financial Services Ltd, which came as the company expressly renounced the approval. It granted the same company authorization as the Alternative Investment Funds Manager (AIFM).

Meanwhile, CySEC CySEC The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) is a financial regulatory authority of Cyprus. CySEC is one of the key watchdog authorities for brokerages in Europe, whose financial regulations and operations comply with the European MiFID financial harmonization law.Founded in 2001, CySEC is instrumental in providing licensing and registration for forex brokers and previously binary options providers.CySEC is responsible for a variety of different functions, which includes the supervision The Cyprus Securities and Exchange Commission (CySEC) is a financial regulatory authority of Cyprus. CySEC is one of the key watchdog authorities for brokerages in Europe, whose financial regulations and operations comply with the European MiFID financial harmonization law.Founded in 2001, CySEC is instrumental in providing licensing and registration for forex brokers and previously binary options providers.CySEC is responsible for a variety of different functions, which includes the supervision Read this Term recently fined and banned multiple former and current directors of the forex and CFDs broker operator, Maxigrid. Furthermore, the brokerage operator lost its CIF license last February.