Culture and governance remains a key focus for the FCA and line with this, the FCA has today launched a new whistleblowing campaign called ‘In confidence, with confidence’ to encourage more reporting of potential misconduct to the FCA by those working in financial services. To support the campaign the FCA has produced: materials for firms … Continue Reading
Executive summary The ability of firms to effectively challenge regulatory decisions on rule-making and rule application is a key part of holding regulators properly to account. Whilst there are existing review mechanisms in place for firms such as the ability to seek judicial review through the courts, some features of these mechanisms may currently be … Continue Reading
On 22 January 2021, the PRA published Policy Statement 1/21: Strengthening Accountability: SM&CR forms update (PS1/21). Due to the short nature of PS1/21 the PRA has presented the text on a webpage without a separate document. With PS1/21 the PRA is: Amending the Notification Form to reflect the new FCA address following their move to … Continue Reading
On 19 January 2021, the European Commission published a Communication on the European economic and financial system: fostering openness, strength and resilience . The Communication and strategy set out therein for development of the European financial markets is designed as one of the early steps of the Commission under Ursula von der Leyen’s leadership to … Continue Reading
On Thursday, 21 January, the Portuguese presidency of the Council holds its first working group on the review of the European Commission’s proposal for a Regulation on digital operational resilience for the financial sector (DORA). The Council is still in its initial phase of examining the proposal. The Council Presidency Is taking an issue-by-issue approach, … Continue Reading
The FCA published a report today on its consumer investments data review, covering the period between 1 January and 31 October 2020. The report details the action the FCA has taken over the same period, in line with its consumer investment objectives, stated as: Stopping and disrupting firms causing consumer harm; Supporting and guiding consumers … Continue Reading
We are pleased to announce that the Regulation Tomorrow Podcast is now available on the Apple Podcasts app (and also on iTunes). Please click here to listen and subscribe to the podcast. Episode 1 focusses on Brexit, featuring interviews with Jonathan Herbst, Imogen Garner and Hannah Meakin.… Continue Reading
We are evolving our successful 40-minute briefings into webinars for financial services professionals. This includes senior management and those in legal, compliance and risk teams who have or are developing financial services expertise. The webinars will be led by senior members of our financial services team from legal, risk consulting and government affairs backgrounds and … Continue Reading
We are evolving our successful 40-minute briefings into webinars for financial services professionals. This includes senior management and those in legal, compliance and risk teams who have or are developing financial services expertise. The webinars will be led by senior members of our financial services team from legal, risk consulting and government affairs backgrounds and … Continue Reading
On 4 September 2020, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) issued a statement confirming that different elements of the new regime under the Securitisation Regulation will come into force on 23 September 2020. The statement follows the publication of seven technical standards implementing the Securitisation Regulation in the Official Journal of the EU. The … Continue Reading
In September 2020, SWIFT (a global member-owned cooperative and provider of secure financial messaging services) published a report to support market participants in understanding the money laundering techniques which underpin large-scale cyber-attacks. The report sets out the end-to-end journey commonly used by criminals to launder funds obtained through illicit cyber-crime related activities, and focusses on … Continue Reading
On 2 September 2020, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) launched a new webpage updating market participants on the pilot of its “digital sandbox” and recent DataSprint. The FCA notes that its latest DataSprint, held in July and August 2020, enabled 120 market participants from multiple sectors and disciplines to collaborate to develop data models and … Continue Reading
Robust governance is the cornerstone of any well-run business. Global regulators will also always look at the strength of this area when they find problems or issues. Organisations therefore need to have a strong board who hold management to account and good governance practices that permeate throughout the business. Global accountability regimes only amplify the … Continue Reading
On 28 August 2020, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published an update to its webpage focused on changes to regulatory reporting during the COVID-19 pandemic. The FCA has permitted extensions to complaints data returns in relation to the 31 August 2020 deadline required by the Dispute Resolution: Complaints Sourcebook (DISP) rule DISP 1.10A.3R(1). The FCA … Continue Reading
On 1 September 2020 the European Services and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a call for evidence to gather insights and feedback from market participants relating to the practical implementation of MiFID II and MiFIR provisions for equity and non-equity instruments. ESMA seek responses on a dedicated template on or before 31 October 2020. Historically, ESMA … Continue Reading
On 26 August the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published its final report relating to the postponement of the effective date of new regulatory technical standards (RTS) on settlement discipline pursuant to Central Securities Depositories Regulation (CSDR). The RTS was initially planned to come into force on 13 September 2020, but in May 2020 … Continue Reading
On 2 June 2020 the European Parliament posed questions relating to the registration and monitoring of Virtual Asset Service Providers (VASPs) in Member States as required by the provisions of the 5th EU Anti-Money Laundering Directive (5AMLD). VASPs include virtual currencies, fiat currencies and custodian wallet providers. Responses were received from the Financial Markets Law … Continue Reading
On 27 August 2020, the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) published a statement setting out its decision to terminate its temporary approach to value-at-risk (VAR) back-testing exceptions from 30 September 2020. This statement follows the PRA’s review of the temporary approach that allowed firms to offset increases due to new back-testing exceptions through a commensurate reduction … Continue Reading
In August 2020 the FCA published its latest edition of Market Watch, issue 64, focussing on the implementation of MiFID II during the Brexit transition period. Importantly, the FCA reminds firms that Brexit temporary transitional powers won’t be applied to transaction reporting rules under MiFID II. Therefore, firm and Approved Reporting Mechanisms (ARMs) must comply … Continue Reading
On 26 August the Institute of International Finance (IIF) provided feedback to the European Commission on its Action Plan for a comprehensive Union policy on preventing money laundering and terrorist financing, published in May 2020. The IIF notes that a more coordinated approach to implement and oversea the EU’s anti-money laundering (AML) and counter terrorism … Continue Reading
On 26 August 2020, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a guidance consultation containing additional draft guidance for mortgage firms in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. It sets out the FCA’s expectations in relation to the fair treatment of mortgage borrowers who are experiencing financial difficulty as a result of the pandemic. This guidance is … Continue Reading
The FCA updated its COVID 19 webpage on 26 August 2020 to announce the launch of a new survey in to the liquidity mismatch in open ended funds. In Q4 last year, the Financial Policy Committee (FPC) judged that the mismatch between redemption terms and the liquidity of some funds’ assets could become a systemic … Continue Reading
On 24 August 2020, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a consultation paper (CP20/17) focused on extending its annual financial crime reporting obligation to include firms that carry on regulated activities that potentially pose a higher money laundering risk. This follows its 2019/20 Business Plan commitment to consider extending the reporting obligation to more firms. … Continue Reading
On 20 August, the European Banking Authority (EBA) updated data relating to the 37 largest institutions in the EU whose leverage ratios exceed EUR 200 billion. This in turn will be used to identify a smaller group of banks which are considered to be global systemically important institutions (G-SIIs). This is the first year that … Continue Reading
