- 238,396 suspected mule accounts were closed in 2025.
- People aged 40 to 49 recorded the sharpest rise in account closures.
- Criminals often move fraudulent funds through two to five mule accounts before cashing out.
Nearly 240,000 suspected money mule accounts were closed by financial firms in the UK last year as banks stepped up efforts to disrupt the movement of criminal funds.
The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) recorded 238,396 reported account closures linked to suspected money mule activity in 2025, up from 233,269 in 2024 and 184,935 in 2023.
Money mules are people whose bank accounts are used to receive, transfer or disguise money generated through criminal activity. Some may knowingly participate, while others can be persuaded to move money through their accounts without fully understanding where it came from.
The FCA's review found that most suspected mule accounts were personal accounts, which accounted for around 92 per cent of closures between 2023 and 2025.
Retail banks and building societies accounted for most of the closures.
A changing picture of money mules
Customers aged 26 to 39 accounted for the highest number of suspected mule account closures, but the sharpest increase was among people in their 40s.
Some 37,274 closures in 2025 were linked to customers aged 40 to 49, compared with 25,760 in 2024.
Younger customers also remained a significant part of the figures. The FCA said suspected mule activity was more concentrated among younger customers at challenger banks, while retail banks reported a more even distribution across age groups.
Where gender information was available, around two-thirds of suspected mules were men. That proportion remained broadly stable over the three-year period.
The regulator cautioned that the data has limitations because not all firms collected the same information and some customers did not disclose their details.
How the money moves
The FCA found that criminals can use a chain of accounts to make fraudulent funds harder to detect and trace.
In many cases, stolen money moved through between two and five mule accounts before being cashed out.
Some accounts had also been used repeatedly for suspected mule activity or fraud, suggesting that certain networks were being used as established routes for moving criminal proceeds rather than for isolated incidents.
Card payments were used in some cases to make large numbers of low-value transactions when cashing out. Cryptocurrency cash-outs were less common but tended to involve larger amounts.
The National Crime Agency estimates that more than £100bn is laundered through the UK or UK corporate structures each year. Money mule activity is one of the methods criminals use to move these funds.
People can be recruited through what appear to be legitimate job offers promising quick money, while others may be asked to transfer funds as a favour.
The FCA warned that becoming involved can have serious consequences, including difficulties accessing banking and credit services and potential criminal prosecution.
Steve Smart, executive director of enforcement and market oversight at the FCA, said money muling makes it harder to recover stolen money and helps criminals move and hide the proceeds of serious offences.
“People should be wary of contact out of the blue, including via online channels, asking them to funnel money through their account as they could face prosecution,” he said.
The FCA said financial firms should improve their understanding of how criminals move funds both within individual institutions and between different firms.
It also highlighted the importance of timely intelligence-sharing to identify linked accounts, recurring cash-out routes and laundering methods before criminal networks can move funds further.
