The 5 Biggest Mistakes UK/EU Firms Make When Expanding Into the US

How AnyAccount Helps

At AnyAccount, our US team supports FinTech founders, MSBs and scaling payment companies with:

• State and federal regulatory licensing strategy, including MSB and money-transmitter frameworks

• Bank sponsorship readiness and partner-bank compliance alignment

• Technology market launches, including payments infrastructure, AML/KYC controls and onboarding flows

• End-to-end MSB governance frameworks with operational playbooks and audit trails

• Examination preparation across FinCEN, state regulators and sponsor-bank reviews

If you want to expand into the world’s most lucrative (and most fragmented) financial market without stepping on regulatory landmines, speak to us. We help UK and EU firms become US-ready from day one.

Everyone wants to “enter the US market.” It is the world’s largest financial services economy, home to the most sophisticated consumer base and, for the brave, a launchpad for exponential scale. But it is also a jurisdiction where expanding without preparation is the corporate equivalent of wandering into a forest in the dark and assuming the path will reveal itself.

For UK and EU firms, especially those accustomed to the FCA, PRA or ESMA’s structured rulebooks, the US can feel like a parallel universe. Many firms learn this the hard way.

Here are the five mistakes we see the most — and why they can quietly derail even the strongest product.

1. Assuming One Licence Covers the Entire Country

In the UK, a single authorisation gives national permission. In the EU, passporting (in its former glory) made cross-border operations straightforward.

In the US:
there is no such thing as a “national money transmitter licence”.

A payments firm may need 53 separate state licences, each with its own regulator, renewal cycle, surety bond, reporting obligations and examination schedule. Some states process applications in months; some take well over a year.

Many UK/EU firms don’t budget for it, don’t timeline for it and don’t staff for it. They plan for one authorisation and discover an entire continent’s worth of applications waiting for them.

2. Underestimating the Power of the Sponsor Bank

In Europe, the regulator is the regulator. In the US, especially for FinTechs, the most powerful oversight body is often your banking partner.

Sponsor banks:

• approve your policies

• review your onboarding flows

• audit your AML programme

• examine your vendors

• restrict your product roadmap

• and can freeze your programme if they don’t like what they see

Firms expecting FCA-style dialogue are often surprised when the bank — not the regulator — dictates operational decisions. Sponsor banks are not optional stakeholders. They are the gateway to the US financial system, and their standards are often higher than the regulator’s.

3. Treating US AML Requirements as “Equivalent” to UK/EU AML

They are not equivalent.

US AML supervision is centred around accountability, not just systems. Regulators and banks want to know:

• who approved what

• who knew what

• which individual is responsible

• and whether staffing is sized to the risk

A beautifully designed AML programme that no one can actually explain will fail an exam. UK/EU firms often assume technological sophistication is enough. In the US, regulators care whether your team truly understands the programme, end-to-end.

4. Assuming US Consumer Protection Is “Lighter”

The US is often viewed as more pro-market and less prescriptive. That may be true in some sectors, but in consumer financial services the US has:

• the CFPB

• the FTC

• dozens of state attorneys general

• state banking departments

• and a litigation culture that makes compliance errors extremely expensive

UK and EU firms often underestimate the risk of class actions, enforcement for “unfair or deceptive practices”, or the reputational damage of public consent orders.

This is not a market where you move fast and break things. Breaking things is how you get sued in three time zones simultaneously.

5. Bringing a UK/EU Governance Model That Doesn’t Fit the US Market

UK/EU firms often arrive with polished governance structures, annual board cycles and centralised compliance teams. In the US, governance must be:

• faster

• more operational

• more granular

• and geared toward real-time oversight

Sponsor banks want dashboards, testing logs, escalation trails, ticketing evidence and weekly reporting. State regulators expect proof that controls work in practice, not just in policy. A European “governance lite” model simply does not survive a US sponsor-bank audit.

The Bottom Line

The US is not harder than the UK or EU — it is simply built on different foundations. Success comes from understanding the system, preparing for its complexity and aligning early with bank-partner expectations.

The firms that thrive are the ones that accept this truth early, adapt quickly and build US-specific governance rather than exporting their European model wholesale.