Dinosaur Merchant Bank Limited

The FCA fined Dinosaur Merchant Bank Limited £338,000 for failing to have effective systems and controls to detect and report suspicious trading in its contracts for difference (CFD) business. A new order system introduced in June 2024 led to a sharp rise in CFD trading (about $3.05bn of trades between June and October 2024) that was not captured by the firm’s automated surveillance; DMBL identified the issue in October 2024 but did not fully remedy it until May 2025 and stopped selling CFDs in May 2025. The FCA found breaches of Article 16(2) of UK MAR (the duty to detect and report suspicious orders/transactions), SYSC 6.1.1R (requirement to maintain adequate systems and controls) and Principle 3 (take reasonable care to organise and control its affairs), and applied a 30% cooperation discount (the fine would have been £482,900 without the discount).