Barclays Blocks Payments to Binance from UK Clients

On Monday, Barclays UK said that it intends to block the use of debit and credit cards when making any forms of payments to Binance. In an email sent to Coindesk, Barclays was quoted saying that it intended to stop credit and debit card payments. However, the restriction should not affect customers who wish to make withdrawals from the crypto exchange.

Since a crackdown on cryptos began in the UK, Barclays has contacted its clients who have recently transacted with Binance, specifically this year, to inform them of their intentions to stop payments to the crypto exchange until otherwise.

Financial regulators from different countries including Canada and Japan have issued notices in a similar fashion in the recent past. Thailand has even threatened to press charges against Binance.

Japan’s financial regulator issued a notice to restrict Binance from operating within its jurisdiction last month. At the same time, the FCA, UK’s financial regulator, followed suit on Saturday and issued a similar notice banning Binance from operating within its jurisdiction. The FCA even went ahead to state that Binance Limited should in no way try to undertake regulated financial activities without its permission. Additionally, the regulator said that any entity affiliated with Binance Group isn’t welcome to transact cryptocurrency business in the UK.

FCA was quoted saying that despite being warned, they have discovered that Binance still does business in the UK through Binance.com, but according to tweets published by Binance, the crypto exchange seemed to go on defense by stating that the relationship between binance.com and its clients hasn’t been affected, since the notice doesn’t affect their cooperation.

Responding to Japan’s notice that was issued last month, a Binance representative said that the crypto exchange neither has any activities related to cryptocurrencies in Japan nor do they solicit Japanese clients. The spokesperson however added that usually, it’s not in their practice to comment on policy and matters related to financial regulators. In March 2018, Binance had been issued a similar warning by Japan’s financial regulator FSA. At the time, FSA accused Binance of criminal charges, and even said that they were in talks with the crypto exchange to try and solve the matter.

With the ongoing crackdown on cryptocurrencies, coupled with a dented corporate image, Binance is likely to attract more unfavorable notices. Some countries may just be copying what their counterparts are doing even without concrete reasons to ban Binance operations within their borders. But amid all the miseries, Barclays’ recent move will undoubtedly be a big blow to Binance.