On 16 December 2025, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published three further consultation papers (CPs) in relation to cryptoasset regulation: (1) CP25/40 – regulating cryptoasset activities; (2) CP25/41 – admissions and disclosures, and market abuse regime, for cryptoassets; and (3) CP25/42 – a prudential regime for cryptoasset firms.

Background

The Government plans to create a UK financial services regulatory regime for cryptoassets, including stablecoins, and on 15 December 2025 HM Treasury (HMT) announced that it had laid the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Cryptoassets) Regulations 2025 (the Regulations). The Regulations will establish new regulated activities for cryptoassets, such as operating a cryptoasset trading platform and issuing stablecoins. Further, the Regulations now also include details of new regimes in relation to admissions and disclosures, and market abuse. 

These proposals follow prior CPs published by the FCA in May 2025 in relation to both stablecoin issues and cryptoasset custody and initial proposals for prudential requirements and in September 2025 on the proposed application of existing FCA Handbook rules to firms conducting regulated cryptoasset activities.

CP25/40 – regulating cryptoasset activities

This CP sets out the FCA’s proposed rules and guidance for some of the new cryptoasset activities, introduced through the change in the legislation, which were not covered in earlier CPs. This consultation includes proposals in relation to:

  • Operating a cryptoasset trading platform (CATP): High-level expectations for location, incorporation, and authorisation of UK CATPs, with further detail to come in proposed guidance. Proposed rules for: access and operation of a UK CATP; mitigating the risks from direct retail access to UK CATPs; managing CATP-specific conflicts of interest; transparency and reporting requirements for UK CATPs, and the FCA signposts its high-level expectations for settlement.
  • Intermediaries: Proposed general execution requirements and other dealing rules and how they should be applied to cryptoasset firms, specific eligibility and execution requirements for retail client orders, requirements to address specific conflicts of interest; pre- and post-trade transparency as well as record keeping and client reporting requirements for cryptoasset intermediaries and, high level expectations for settlement arrangements.
  • CATPs and intermediaries: Increasing transparency to aid price formation and ensuring appropriate record keeping and reporting to clients.
  • Lending and borrowing: Retail access, consumer understanding, use of proprietary tokens, liquidity and counterparty risk, and record keeping requirements.
  • Staking: Proposing that regulated staking firms will be required to give retail clients information about the firm and its staking service and that firms will be required to provide the key terms of agreement relating to their staking service to retail clients and obtain the retail clients’ express prior consent in relation to those terms.
  • Approach for decentralised finance (DeFi): Proposals to apply the requirements in this CP and the wider cryptoasset regime to firms engaging in DeFi, where there is a clear controlling person(s) carrying on one or more of the new cryptoasset activities.

CP25/41 – admissions and disclosures, and market abuse regime, for cryptoassets

The FCA sets out that the Regulations will provide the foundation for a new regulatory regime for public offers of qualifying cryptoassets and their admission to trading on CATPs (the A&D regime) alongside a Market Abuse Regime for Cryptoassets (MARC), that both regimes will be introduced through the Designated Activities Regime (DAR) under Part 5A of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 and that the DAR framework enables the Government to ‘designate’ activities, and to give the FCA rule-making, supervisory and enforcement powers over these activities. The FCA further explains that the Regulations designate a range of activities including offering qualifying cryptoassets to the public, admitting qualifying cryptoassets to trading, prohibiting the use and disclosure of inside information and market manipulation regarding qualifying cryptoassets, and certain stablecoin-related activities.

In relation to this, the FCA highlights that its proposed rules and guidance, based on the designated activities set out in the Regulations, cover: the offering to the public of qualifying cryptoassets that are or will be admitted to trading on a CATP, the admission of qualifying cryptoassets to trading on CATPs, disclosure obligations relating to admissions to trading and the issuance of UK issued qualifying stablecoins,  and requirements to prevent, detect and disrupt market abuse in cryptoasset markets.

The FCA also makes clear that firms and individuals carrying on designated activities do not need to be authorised by the FCA unless they also carry out regulated activities, but that CATPs, intermediaries and other relevant market participants carrying out a designated activity will need to follow both the requirements of the Regulations and the FCA rules for that designated activity.

CP25/42 – a prudential regime for cryptoasset firms

The FCA sets out that in CP25/15 it introduced two new prudential sourcebooks – COREPRU and CRYPTOPRU and covered some aspects of the prudential regime for regulated cryptoasset firms, with a particular focus on stablecoin issuers and custodians of cryptoassets, but that this CP builds on those proposals and focuses on the remaining cryptoasset activities.

In this CP the FCA sets out its proposed prudential requirements for all cryptoasset firms that will need to be authorised and builds on proposals in its earlier CP25/15 to extend the scope of the proposals to the remaining cryptoasset activities, namely operating a CATP, staking, arranging deals, dealing as agent and dealing as principal in qualifying cryptoassets. It also contains additional proposals that were deferred from CP25/15 in relation to the overall prudential regime for cryptoasset firms.

In particular, this CP sets out proposals in relation to own funds requirements including permanent minimum requirements in relation to remaining activities and K-factor requirements in relation to remaining activities; overall risk assessment requirements; and requirements relating to the public disclosure of prudential information.

Next Steps

The FCA has asked for feedback on these proposals by 12 February 2026.

The FCA has also explained that final rules in relation to each of these consultations will be set out in policy statements in 2026, as per its Crypto Roadmap.