PayPal to pause United Kingdom(UK) crypto purchases starting in October
It was announced in an email to select users on Aug. 14 that PayPal would temporarily pause crypto-buying services in the U.K. in the coming months.
According to the message, the service will be paused starting Oct. 1, 2023, and will resume in early 2024 at an unspecified date. While purchasing will be inaccessible, PayPal stated that users will be able to hold and sell their cryptocurrency during the outage. The company did not specify if users will be able to transfer cryptocurrency to other wallets and exchanges, but it appears that this feature is currently only available to customers in the United States. The company promised users that their cryptocurrency is safe and that there will be no price for retaining it. I apologized to the clients for the inconvenience.
U.K. rules require updated compliance
PayPal announced a pause in crypto purchases due to the Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) new rules. According to the company, the new restrictions will require it to “implement additional steps before customers can purchase crypto.”
The corporation did not say which rules are in question. The United Kingdom will begin enforcing a Crypto Travel Rule in September 2023, requiring crypto businesses to collect information about persons involved in transactions, albeit the September deadline does not appear to coincide with PayPal’s October service shift. The FCA also recently implemented new promotional guidelines aimed at controlling how cryptocurrency is sold or advertised to potential investors.
PayPal’s curtailed U.K. services are noteworthy because the corporation is growing its crypto operations in the US. On August 7, the firm announced the launch of its own USD stablecoin. Later, a PayPal executive speculated that the stablecoin could be widely used in DeFi. According to some sources, the corporation is integrating its services into a “Cryptocurrency Hub.”
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