On 9 April 2018, the PRA published its Business Plan for 2018/19.

In his CEO foreword Sam Woods states that the PRA continues to do a huge amount of work to promote an orderly UK withdrawal from the EU. He explains that this work falls into three main areas, the PRA:

  • is working with the UK Government to make sure the PRA Rulebook remains fully operable and coherent when the UK leaves the EU;
  • is providing technical advice to the UK Government in relation to its negotiations with the EU; and
  • is keeping well across firms’ plans to restructure across the border with the rest of the EU while aiming to ensure that the process for authorising the provision of financial services in the UK runs as smoothly as possible.

The foundation of the PRA’s approach remains the presumption that there will continue to be a high degree of supervisory cooperation between the UK and the EU, and that the openness of both global financial centres benefits both sides.

The Business Plan states that the PRA’s strategic goals are to:

  • have in place robust prudential standards comprising the post-crisis regulatory regime (pages 10-11);
  • continue to adapt to changes in the external market and to hold regulated firms, and those who run them, accountable for meeting the PRA’s standards (pages 11-12);
  • ensure that firms are adequately capitalised, and have sufficient liquidity, for the risks they are running or planning to take (pages 12-14);
  • develop its supervision of operational resilience in order to mitigate the risk of disruption to the provision of critical economic functions (pages 14-15);
  • ensure that banks and insurers have credible plans in place to enable them to recover from stress events, and that the PRA has a credible resolution strategy to manage a firm’s failure in an orderly manner (pages 15–16);
  • facilitate effective competition by actively considering the proportionality of its approach as it contributes to the safety and soundness of the UK financial system (page 16);
  • deliver a smooth transition to a sustainable and resilient UK financial regulatory framework following the UK’s exit from the EU (page 17); and
  • operate effectively by ensuring that resources are allocated to work that best advances the PRA’s strategy and reduced the greatest risks to the delivery of its statutory objectives (pages 18-19).