FCA bans trio behind £35.5m scheme designed to bypass visa rules

The FCA has decided to ban 3 former senior figures at Dolfin Financial (UK) Limited (Dolfin) after finding they ran a scheme that helped clients bypass UK visa rules. Former chief executive Denisz Nagy has been fined £324,800 and former finance director Sanjay Maraj £122,000 for their roles in the scheme. Both have been banned from working in financial services. The FCA has also decided to ban Dolfin co-founder, Roman Joukovski, from working in financial services. Between 2016 and 2019, most clients using the scheme paid a fee of £400,000 instead of investing £2m of their own money in UK companies, as required under the Home Office investor visa rules. The FCA found the scheme was deliberately designed to create the false impression that the visa requirements had been met. The scheme enabled at least 99 individuals to obtain investor visas and generated at least £35.5m in fees for Dolfin-connected businesses and the immigration agents that introduced clients.The FCA found that Mr Nagy and Mr Joukovski played leading roles in creating and operating the scheme, while Mr Maraj was responsible for the financial aspects once it was set up. Mr Nagy and Mr Maraj also deliberately conceale