When the UK Fintech Academic Network convened in May 2025, a provocative question echoed across its panels and breakouts: has open banking become a white elephant? Eight months later, that critique still surfaces in boardrooms and fintech forums, but it increasingly collides with evidence that open banking has moved from “initiative” to embedded infrastructure. A project once heralded as a revolution in consumer finance is now being judged for its limited visibility and uneve

It has been twelve months since I last wrote about Phi , the 58.5-metre superyacht detained under the UK's Russia sanctions regime. In that time, nothing has changed. She remains where she has been since 2022, moored in the same spot at Canary Wharf, her bright blue hull fading under the weather and her once-impeccable finish showing signs of neglect. Each morning I see her from our apartment window, an unmissable silhouette against the water. What was once a temporary act of

Financial crime compliance has always been shaped by the information available to us. We trust media reports, legal filings, regulatory notices, and increasingly, online data streams to help identify risk. As adverse media screening evolves from keyword search to machine-led intelligence, many firms have embraced the promise of scale. The claim that artificial intelligence can scan eight million data sources a day feels like an irresistible answer to a complex problem. Yet th

The financial services industry has long relied on employees to act as a final line of defence against misconduct. From exposing...

A Politically Exposed Person (PEP) is an individual entrusted with a prominent public function who may present a heightened risk of...

AI-generated fable remix: the tortoise plays it safe, the robot hare bolts ahead, but who is the ultimate winner? Generative AI, once a...

The assumption that bribery and corruption are more prevalent in developing nations has been a longstanding tenet of both media...

Fraud is no longer the work of lone actors exploiting isolated weaknesses. In today’s digital economy, financial crime has evolved into a...

We are living through a profound transformation in the architecture of risk. The convergence of deepfake technologies, generative...

It has been little more than a month since United States President Donald Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the former chief executive of Binance. Zhao, better known as CZ, had pleaded guilty in 2023 to enabling money laundering through the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange. He served four months in prison, paid a substantial fine, and agreed to step down as CEO. The case was described by the US Department of Justice as a landmark in crypto enforcement. Yet, during an int

The term narco-terrorism, once an academic and counter-terrorism buzzword, has entered the mainstream of United States criminal justice and political discourse. Its resurgence is not coincidental. On 13 May 2025, the Department of Justice (DoJ) unsealed a sweeping indictment against multiple leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel , charging them with narco-terrorism, material support of terrorism, and drug trafficking. This landmark case marks the first time such charges have been app

Economic sanctions are the sharp edge of modern diplomacy. In a world marked by geopolitical fracture and strategic competition, they function as tools of coercion and containment, targeting adversaries without the deployment of armed force. But not all sanctions are created or enforced equally. In the UK, financial sanctions and trade sanctions operate within distinct legal and institutional frameworks. Financial sanctions, enforced by the Office of Financial Sanctions Imple