emre yumlu 
The UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced that “Retardio” is not authorized to provide financial services in the country.
The FCA issued a warning regarding the Solana-based “Retardio” project, citing unauthorized financial promotions and activities targeting UK consumers.
In a statement on December 16, the FCA warned that the token might be providing or promoting financial services without the regulator’s approval.
The regulator reminded consumers to transact only with FCA-approved firms to ensure adequate protection. According to CryptoSlam, the Retardio project features a Solana-based NFT collection that has achieved $31 million in total sales.
The associated memecoin, as reported by Dexscreener, is currently trading at around $0.08 with a market capitalization of approximately $87 million.
The Retardio Project Responded To The FCA
According to the FCA, UK-based users dealing with the Retardio project will not have access to the Financial Ombudsman Service, which resolves complaints between consumers and financial services firms. The regulator also stated that consumers would not be covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS), which protects consumers if financial firms go bankrupt.
The FCA added, “This means it’s unlikely you’d get your money back if the firm goes out of business.”
The FCA urged citizens to deal with authorized firms. The regulator emphasized that authorized firms provide greater protection to consumers when things go wrong and suggested users check their registry to ensure the firm they are dealing with is authorized in the UK.
The government agency also encouraged reporting unauthorized firms through official channels. In a humorous response, the memecoin and NFT project said, “We’ve issued a warning about the UK’s financial regulator.”
Memecoins Represent The Value of Attention
Yat Siu, Chairman of Animoca Brands, stated that memecoins capture the value of user attention, which is different from traditional metrics on social platforms.
Siu mentioned that attention on social platforms does not transparently reflect the value of user-generated content (UGC), but memecoins work differently.
He explained that in the Web3 world, UGC culture is integrated into memecoins, with their market capitalization reflecting the value of the attention they receive.
“If attention were a token, that’s exactly what memecoins represent. So I see it as correlated between the two,” he said.
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