Update 2: shares resumed, following a statement of sorts.

The Company can confirm that on 9 January 2015, its UK subsidiary, Plus500UK Limited (“Plus500UK”), was required by the FCA under section 166 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (“Section 166″) (see notes) to appoint a Skilled Person to conduct a review of its Anti-Money Laundering (“AML”) and financial sanction systems and other related regulatory controls. The Skilled Person’s review is normally a confidential process but in light of recent events the Board believes it is prudent to inform the market of the review. In addition to the Skilled Person’s review, on 30 October 2014 Plus500UK provided a Voluntary Requirement (“VREQ”) to the Financial Conduct Authority (“FCA”) whereby Plus500UK was prohibited from conducting all transactions for customers without the appropriate AML documentation.

Following completion of the Skilled Person’s Review, on 15 May 2015 Plus500UK provided a further VREQ to the FCA whereby Plus500UK was required, amongst other things, to prohibit all transactions for existing customers until additional AML documentation had been provided and cease on-boarding any new clients until new AML procedures had been implemented. Plus500UK’s dialogue with the FCA regarding the Section 166 and the VREQs is ongoing.

Update 1: Shares suspended

Trading on AIM for the under-mentioned securities has been temporarily suspended from 22/05/2015 10:15am, pending an announcement.

—–

Shares in Plus500, the Israel based contract for difference group listed on London’s junior market, dropped by another quarter on Friday. The collapse comes after the company on Monday announced it had suspended more than half of UK customer accounts, pending additional anti-money laundering checks.

At pixel the shares were 288p, down from a recent high of 770p. Friday’s move followed the publication of a series of blogs about the company by Jacob Ma-Weaver of Cable Car Capital, an investment advisor based in San Francisco.

Cable Car is short the shares of Plus500. No doubt the company, or its advisors, will address some of the questions raised by Mr Ma-Weaver — such as the request for clarification about aspects of the companies accounting — in time.