Investment Platform Lightyear to Relaunch in the UK with Direct FCA Authorisation

  • Infrastructure
  • 28.11.2024 11:45 am

Investment platform Lightyear announces that it received direct authorisation from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) earlier this year, and will be relaunching for consumers and businesses in the UK, with FSCS protection, ISAs and more. 

Lightyear has been regulated in the UK as an appointed representative of RiskSave Technologies Ltd, who are authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. This appointed representative (AR) designation allows brokerages like Lightyear to get started quickly, authorising them to carry out regulated services on a FCA regulated principal firm’s behalf. 

Having secured direct authorisation from the FCA, Lightyear is relaunching in the UK. Under the newly authorised company – Lightyear UK – customers will benefit from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), something only available to investment firms who are directly authorised. This protects assets up to the FSCS limit of £85,000 per customer, per financial institution.1 

In preparation for this relaunch in January, Lightyear has been gradually building out a strong UK team. Alongside a handful of new hires in its London office, it today announces that Wander Rutgers, Lightyear’s COO, has stepped into a newly created UK CEO role. Before becoming COO at Lightyear in May 2022, Wander was the President of the UK for Robinhood, and before this led expansion at Wise (prev. Transferwise) and product at Plum. 

This FCA authorisation enables Lightyear to launch a number of new products in the UK. The platform announces that it will be launching ISAs, in time for the end of this tax year. 

The recent Autumn Budget demonstrated that the government is encouraging people in the UK to build long term investment strategies; they increased capital gains tax from 20% to just 24%, not the rumoured 40%, and there was no introduction to ISA limits, which were also rumoured to be announced.

Wander Rutgers, COO and UK CEO at Lightyear: “The sooner you become a successful investor, the faster you find financial freedom. While the UK investing market may seem crowded, when you look at where the money is, it’s not: the vast majority of people use high street banks, or incumbent brokers like Hargreaves Lansdown. These products have high fees, limited flexibility and limited instrument options. They don’t offer a good solution for people in the UK to save for their future. 

As for fintech options, a number of companies have tried and failed to compete here. This is because they only build for one market: many US platforms have attempted to expand into the UK, but have been unsuccessful, forgetting that the UK has a different currency, different tax systems and very different regulatory structures. People treat money differently here and have different attitudes towards investing; although we share a language with the US, the UK is not the 51st state of America. 

The fintechs that do exist hold a tiny share of the market. And they either have lots of caveats and fees like the incumbents, or they’re cross-subsiding with risky gambling-like products; on the surface they may offer some of the top rates or advertise free trading, but beneath this they have a sustainability strategy that relies on making money from taking bets against customers by offering instruments like CFDs - you can see on their websites that 80% of their customers lose money using these.

Lightyear is firmly against this ‘casino-style’ approach. Instead, we’re building an investment platform that people will trust with their long term wealth. We’re targeting the same customers that use platforms like Hargreaves Lansdown, but we’re not charging the massive fees, or making the experience really clunky.

Unlike others who’ve tried to enter the UK with no experience, we’ve been live here since the start, so we’ve had years of experience in the UK, combined with years of experience building a 'global-local' tailored product in each of our other 21 markets.  

This marks the start of our journey to become the best investing platform for the UK. We now have nothing standing in our way, and we’re ready to help everyone find financial freedom for their future.” 

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