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In the first six months of 2021, the UK FCA opened approximately 300 crypto-related cases.

The UK's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) opened more than 300 proceedings relating to organisations presumably involved in crypto assets between April 1 and September 30 2021, according to an announcement on the Financial Conduct Authority's official website.

The financial watchdog announced that 50 investigations are ongoing, including "criminal probes" into enterprises that have not registered with them. The FCA said in its consumer investments data review published on Thursday that the cases were initiated after the agency received hundreds of complaints about probable scams.

"The FCA received 16,400 enquires about probable frauds between April and September last year, up nearly a third from the same time in 2020." Cryptoasset, boiler room, and recovery room frauds were among the most common types of scams reported to the FCA."

In order to protect investors, the FCA has been tightening down on crypto businesses and advertising in the country. It said in January that it would limit marketing pushing cryptocurrency to sophisticated investors.

Only 33 crypto companies are now registered with the FCA. As of March 2, the FCA had accepted temporary registrations for 22 crypto companies.

The FCA, according to data released, prohibited one out of every four firms from accessing the market between April and September 2021, though these are not all crypto firms. There was also an uptick in reports of probable crypto frauds, according to the statistics.

"During this time, our cryptoasset team at Supervision opened almost 300 cases involving suspected unregistered cryptoasset enterprises, many of which are likely to be scams. 172 firms were added to our list of unregistered cryptoasset businesses within the same time period "According to the data report.