The UK's accountancy regulator has launched an investigation into KPMG over its audits and financing arrangements connected to State Oil Limited, part of the collapsed Prax Group. The Financial Reporting Council said it will use two separate procedures to examine State Oil's accounts from 2021 to 2024, looking into KPMG's work on the company's books along with an unnamed individual accountant.
The inquiry will also cover the 2024 audit of State Oil carried out by mid-tier firm PKF Littlejohn, which took over from KPMG that year. Prax Group and its Lindsey oil refinery in north-east England fell into insolvency in 2025, putting more than 400 jobs at risk and dealing a blow to the UK's struggling oil refining sector. The collapse triggered strong criticism from the UK government, which called for an investigation into Prax's wealthy owner and said the company had been unable to answer government questions about its finances.
Security audits have not been enough to protect many cryptocurrency platforms from costly hacks, according to a report from crypto market data site CoinGecko dated August 27. Between January 2025 and July 2026, cryptocurrency platforms lost more than $3.63 billion to a range of cyberattacks and stolen passkeys, the report said. About 88 percent of the stolen funds and roughly 60 percent of the affected platforms had completed independent security audits, with most attacks targeting areas that such audits typically do not cover.
Bybit suffered the largest losses, citing the $1.4 billion February 2025 theft that Elliptic attributed to North Korea. KelpDao followed with $292 million lost, and Drift Protocol came next with $285 million lost, according to the report.