Kristo Käärmann, the billionaire co-founder and chief executive of the money transfer company Wise, has been fined £350,000 by the financial regulator over his failure to notify it about “significant tax issues”.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) said that Käärmann failed to notify the regulator initially about a previous tax issue and fine during an assessment in 2021 of whether he was “fit and proper” to run a company.
HM Revenue & Customs fined him £365,651 in February 2021 for deliberately failing to notify them of a capital gains tax liability after he sold shares worth £10 million in 2017. In September 2021 it added him to its public tax defaulters’ list.
“Käärmann failed to appropriately consider the significance of the tax issues and