Compliance & Ethics

BaFin issued a public warning on September 14, 2026, that the operator of berlinbank(.)eu is offering banking and cryptocurrency services in Germany without the required authorization. The warning is a reminder that unlicensed activity, impersonation, and online investment fraud remain active threats. Compliance teams should use it to refresh screening, monitoring, and customer-protection controls.

AMLA Executive Board Member Hennie Verbeek-Kusters used the 83rd IBSA General Membership Meeting in Brussels on September 14, 2026 to outline AMLA's priorities for financial intelligence. She emphasized relevant, accurate and timely intelligence, stronger feedback loops across the AML/CFT system, cross-border information-sharing, and new public-private information-sharing mechanisms. Compliance teams should treat this as a signal of supervisory expectations on suspicious activity reporting quality and cooperation.

Premier Payment Solutions Ltd (trading as PPS Money and MTBS), a UK small payment institution, entered voluntary liquidation on September 10, 2026, and joint liquidators from BTG Begbies Traynor have been appointed. Customer funds are not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), and small payment institutions are not required to safeguard funds under the Payment Services Regulations 2017. Compliance teams at firms with exposure to PPS Money, whether as customers, counterparties, or agent networks, should assess their positions promptly.

Superintendent Routledge announced that OSFI is recalibrating its risk appetite. Financial system resilience remains the primary responsibility, but OSFI is adding an enhanced focus on supporting sustainable economic growth and on promoting competitive intensity. Compliance teams should expect capital amendments this fall and in 2027, easier market entry, and an annual regulatory burden reduction program. These changes will affect capital planning, supervisory engagement, and regulatory change management.

The SEC's Division of Examinations published a Risk Alert detailing observations on how investment advisers conduct the annual compliance review required under the Advisers Act compliance rule (Rule 206(4)-7). The alert identifies areas advisers should consider and encourages them to strengthen their review processes. Compliance teams should treat it as a preview of examination priorities and benchmark their current review practices against it.

The FSA's September 14, 2026 weekly review lists a draft partial amendment to the Comprehensive Guidelines for Supervision for Insurance Companies, new sustainability assurance and growth-funding council activity, and disaster-related measures for financial institutions. It also lists an unregistered money lending warning and draft EDINET Taxonomy updates for 2027. Compliance teams with Japanese operations should review the open consultation and the disaster reporting relief now, because several items carry action dates or likely downstream obligations.

The Netherlands Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) projects that households and businesses will pay an average of 20 percent more for electricity and natural-gas transport in 2027. For an average household, that is roughly EUR $89 more per year for electricity and EUR $52 more for gas. The increase is the first under a new revenue methodology and is driven by system operators' investment needs of approximately EUR $235 Billion over 15 years. Compliance teams with Dutch exposure should reassess energy cost assumptions, pass-through arrangements, and customer communications.