After receiving a warning from the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), pump.fun has officially banned UK users from accessing its website.
pump.fun shuts down in UK after FCA warning
On December 3, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) issued a warning emphasizing that the memecoin issuance platform pump.fun is not licensed to operate in the UK and may be targeting users in this country.
Warning about pump.fun on FCA website
The agency said:
"It is important to note that in the UK, companies providing cryptocurrency-related services must register if they are subject to anti-money laundering regulations. If UK residents use pump.fun, they will not enjoy a number of important protections and will almost certainly lose money if something goes wrong."
Just two days after the FCA warning, pump.fun updated its terms of service, officially banning users from the UK from accessing the project's website.
JUST IN: 🇬🇧 UK restricts access to Pump․Fun pic.twitter.com/zMl5JDG1YU
— Watcher.Guru (@WatcherGuru) December 6, 2024
According to the announcement, the UK is currently XEM a “restricted jurisdiction”. The reason given is that pump.fun needs to comply with the country’s legal regulations.
Anonymous pump.fun team member Alon confirmed that this was a voluntary decision on the part of the platform, and that there was no pressure from the FCA to stop providing services to UK users, while also asserting that this “ban” is permanent.
Additionally, pump.fun also noted that users in jurisdictions deemed high-risk or sanctioned by the UK, US, European Union, and countries sanctioned by the United Nations will not be allowed to use the platform's services.
The list of countries currently banned from accessing pump.fun includes Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria, Russia, and the UK.
Pump.fun's move to "ban" UK users also clearly shows the strictness of cryptocurrency management in this country. Previously, in 2020, the FCA required all companies operating in the cryptocurrency sector to be licensed before providing services to British citizens. However, out of a total of 347 applications, only 47 companies were approved by the FCA.
Despite the ban, many people have Chia tips to "circumvent the law", bypassing regulators such as using VPN to access the platform or unblocking pump.fun by interfering with the website's source code.
For the UK gang who want to rug on https://t.co/hvwQnX9NJF
— scott (@jshwifsolana) December 6, 2024
Open developer tools, click network, search "valid", right click on the request, click "Block" and refresh your browser
thank me later fam pic.twitter.com/R3lPMD1pQe
https://t.co/7JHhpfnyfl banned in the UK. Oh no degens how will you shitcoin now?
— Wann0wfhc (@wann0wfhc) December 6, 2024
Bring in @Synk_ws $Synk offers a fully decentralized operating system in which you can connect to Firefox.
Built in VPN, no logs of your business so it's fully private.
Have a look $ SOL degens
As for pump.fun, the memecoin issuance platform valued at $1.5 billion has faced a lot of criticism regarding its legality and ethics throughout its operations.
Starting from promoting the memecoin pump-dump , to tolerating inappropriate behavior on its platform by not censoring content Chia by users, many people have lost their sympathy for this project.
However, there is no denying that pump.fun became a phenomenon thanks to the memecoin investment craze on Solana throughout 2024.
Pump.fun's appeal was so great that its daily revenue at one point surpassed Ethereum's . Additionally, as pump.fun cooled down, transaction fees on Solana also dropped to their lowest level in half a year .
As of December 7, pump.fun has generated over $290 million since its launch, with pump.fun's 24-hour fee revenue regularly ranging from $2-5 million/day.
Pump.fun Revenue Statistics . Source: @adam_tehc on Dune Analytics as of the afternoon of December 7, 2024
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