The FCA has published a speech by Tracy McDermott, Acting Chief Executive, delivered at the Association of British Insurers Conference, entitled Moving towards a sustainable model of regulation.

Among the topics discussed, Ms McDermott dedicated part of her speech to discuss the depth and liquidity of Europe’s capital markets, the opportunities they afford UK investors and the scope for progress. Ms McDermott stated that “although EU capital markets have developed over recent decades, fragmentation persists with a strong national bias, and there is a well-documented lack of depth compared to the US.”

Although the European Commission’s recent launch of the Capital Markets Union (CMU) is intended to address this issue at an EU level, Ms McDermott believes that it is important to assess the UK’s domestic market and ensure it is able to support the wider aims of the CMU.

Particularly, Ms McDermott stated that the FCA is interested in working alongside industry and exploring the effectiveness of the UK primary markets. To further this, Ms McDermott announced that the FCA will be creating and chairing a UK Debt Market Forum, which will bring together a broad range of parties to look for practical measures to enhance the UK primary debt markets.

Ms McDermott also announced that alongside the Debt Market Forum, the FCA is setting up a broader project to assess the effectiveness of the UK primary markets more generally. Particularly the project will look to consider how successful the current structure of the UK primary markets are in meeting the needs of issuers and investors in the real economy and the extent to which it is able to continue to support innovative and growing sectors of the economy, whilst of course maintaining high standards.

View Moving towards a sustainable model of regulation, 3 November 2015