Investment scams saw a 34 per cent increase in losses in 2024 hitting £144.4mn, the first recorded rise since 2021.

The UK Finance Annual Fraud report revealed £1.17bn was lost to fraudsters overall in 2024 with 3.31mn confirmed cases.

Looking at investment scams specifically, cases fell by nearly a quarter in 2024 to 7,767, to the lowest since 2020, however losses were on the rise.

According to UK Finance the fall in cases and rise in losses marked a change in the profile of authorised push payment fraud compared with what it had observed in recent years.

Investment scams accounted for nearly a third of all APP losses last year, the data revealed.

“We noted last year that investment scams linked to cryptocurrencies have been on the rise and with increasing value and popularity, this is likely to be among the drivers of the loss increase in 2024,” the report explained.

UK Finance said it may see an upward revision to the 2024 data on investment scams as the data only reports closed APP cases but the nature of investment scams means it can take longer for some cases to be resolved.

https://www.ftadviser.com/fraud/2025/6/2/investment-scam-losses-hit-144mn-in-2024/