A company which claimed to offer advice to help people invest in cryptocurrency has been shut down following investigations by the Insolvency Service.

Amey Finance Academy was wound-up at the High Court in London on 30 April.

The firm’s sole director and shareholder, Desmond Amey, had offered assurances to consumers that their cryptocurrency investments were solid.

However, complaints were made that consumers lost money in investment opportunities and Amey Finance Academy was classified by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) as providing financial services or products in the UK without its authorisation.

Chief investigator at the Insolvency Service, Mark George, said: “Desmond Amey used Amey Finance Academy to recklessly persuade individuals to invest in cryptocurrency schemes and mislead them about the risks of doing so.

“His claims to offer a financial education and concierge service will be of no comfort to customers who lost their money in investments he actively encouraged.”

Amey Finance Academy was set up in December 2018, declaring on social media that it was “an established and successful independent consultancy providing a plethora of financial services”. The firm also claimed to run an industry-leading education academy.

However, the investigations have revealed that Amey made misrepresentations, assuring one customer who went on to lose all the money they invested that their investment would not drop below 90%.

In WhatsApp messages seen by Insolvency Service investigators, Amey told another customer the investments were “100 certy” and to “trust me bro”.

Amey Finance Academy promoted cryptocurrency schemes run by other companies, including HyperFund, which raised more than $1.7bn from investors worldwide. Warnings about HyperFund were issued in the UK with the company also investigated by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, who charged its founder with fraud in January 2024.

In his interviews, Amey provided contradictory information about his company’s relationship with HyperFund and said he only used the Amey Finance Academy business bank account to help people buying cryptocurrency via a separate company called Bleuguava.

Investigators revealed how Amey’s failure to provide up-to-date accounting records meant the Insolvency Service could not establish the true relationship between Amey Finance Academy and HyperFund or Bleuguava.

Further investigations by the Insolvency Service revealed that Amey had misrepresented himself through email signatures, before he released a video via YouTube in October 2023 implying that he still had a presence at a Canary Wharf office in London. In reality, he had been evicted for failing to pay rent in January of that year.

His company subsequently failed to register an address with Companies House to receive official correspondence.

George added: “The failure to deliver adequate accounting records and a general lack of transparency shown has prevented the Insolvency Service from establishing the true extent of the company’s activities, its assets and liabilities, or the use of £5m which passed through the company’s bank account between October 2019 and March 2022.

“The public deserve protection from companies trading in an opaque and objectionable manner which is why we applied to have Amey Finance Academy shut down.”

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