SRA faces £700k costs bill after losing Carter-Ruck partner OneCoin case

The SRA could be forced to pay up to £700,000 in costs after losing its high-profile misconduct case against Carter-Ruck partner Claire Gill tied to the OneCoin cryptocurrency scandal.

In a judgment published on Monday (9 March), the tribunal ruled that the regulator must cover Gill’s legal costs from 2 May 2025 onwards, with the final figure to be determined through a detailed assessment.

£1m costs claim

Gill had applied for around £1 million in costs following the collapse of the prosecution in December 2025, including a request for an interim payment of approximately £750,000. The tribunal declined to award an interim payment, but confirmed the regulator would be liable for costs in principle.

The decision is notable because the usual starting point in SDT proceedings is that the regulator does not pay the respondent’s costs when a prosecution fails.

The ruling follows another setback for the SRA’s anti-SLAPP enforcement efforts after the High Court overturned misconduct findings against Osborne Clarke partner Ashley Hurst earlier this year and ordered the regulator to pay his costs.

Failed prosecution

The SRA had brought disciplinary proceedings against Gill, a partner at specialist London defamation firm Carter-Ruck, alleging she had issued an improper threat of litigation in 2017 while acting for OneCoin and its founder Ruja Ignatova.


The allegation related to a letter Gill sent to a victim of the scheme who had posted videos and comments online describing OneCoin as a fraud after losing her inheritance.

The regulator argued that the correspondence amounted to an improper threat of litigation intended to silence criticism rather than advance a genuine legal claim. The SRA also claimed there was a “strong possibility” that Gill knew the scheme was fraudulent.

In December 2025 the tribunal summarily dismissed the case, finding the prosecution was legally flawed and unsupported by sufficient evidence, describing the letter as moderate in tone and consistent with standard letters before action used in defamation cases.

The tribunal concluded that Gill had acted in good faith on client instructions and that the letter was a legitimate attempt to protect her client’s reputation.

The SRA is appealing the tribunal’s decision to dismiss the case.

OneCoin backstory

OneCoin was later exposed as a global fraud estimated to have cost investors around $4 billion. The scheme marketed itself as a rival to Bitcoin, promising investors they were buying into a fast-growing cryptocurrency.

In reality, investigators later concluded there was no genuine cryptocurrency or blockchain behind it, with the operation instead relying on new investors buying packages tied to tokens that had no real market value.

Its founder, Bulgarian entrepreneur Ignatova, widely known as the “Cryptoqueen”, was charged in the US with fraud and money laundering. She disappeared in 2017 and remains on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list. Her co-founder was sentenced to 20 years in prison.