Another FCA blunder: Draconian crowdfunding rules threaten innovation April 3, 2014 HERE’S a question for all you clever City A.M. readers. What did the UK’s financial regulator do recently to provoke the following quote? “On a day like today, one has to wonder whether the Financial Conduct Authority is the worst regulator in the Western world.” You might well guess that it was the FCA’s cock-up [...]
Osborne fumes at FCA blunder April 1, 2014 GEORGE Osborne piled pressure on the City watchdog yesterday, demanding to know how and why the carnage in insurance stocks was allowed to happen last Friday. His intervention came after the Financial Conduct Authority briefed a reporter on its probe of insurance products dating back to the 1970s – but only gave markets a full [...]
FCA boss Wheatley says he won’t quit over insurance blunder April 1, 2014 Martin Wheatley is not intending to step down as chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority after last week’s embarrassing episode when it bungled an announcement on a new insurance probe. The regulator is investigating the fees and charges faced by savers with policies dating back forty years. The announcement saw shares in insurers plummet [...]
FCA hits Santander UK with £12.4m fine March 26, 2014 The Financial Conduct Authority has fined Santander UK £12.4m for “widespread investment advice failings”. The regulator said there was “significant risk” of the lender giving unsuitable advice to its customers. It's also found an “inadequate” approach to considering investors’ risk appetites and, when it came to some customers, the bank apparently failed to regularly check [...]
FCA bans and fines trader £663k for manipulating gilt price during QE March 20, 2014 Mark Stevenson, a bond trader with almost 30 years’ experience, has been banned from the industry and fined £662,700 for deliberately manipulating a UK government bond – gilt – on 10 October 2011. Stevenson has a holding worth £1.2bn, which he intended to sell to the Bank of England for an artificially high price during [...]
BoAML director to join FCA as investment boss March 12, 2014 Another high-profile hire for the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The regulator’s announced this morning that it’s appointed Julia Hoggett as head of investment banking in its supervision division. Hoggett, who’ll start in early May, joins the regulator from Bank of America Merrill Lynch, where she’s currently a managing director responsible for a variety of debt [...]
FCA confirms new rules for crowdfunding March 6, 2014 The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has confirmed new rules for crowdfunding which, it says, will help protect consumers. Its aim is to give people more access to “fair, clear information” when using loan-based or securities-based crowd funding platforms. £28m was raised through crowdfunding last year – a 600 per cent increase from 2012. The FCA [...]
FCA announces new regulator for £75 trillion payments systems industry March 5, 2014 Another announcement this morning from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). The City watchdog has unveiled plans for a new regulator to oversee UK payment systems. Introduced by April of next year, the regulator will monitor the £75 trillion payment systems industry, which processes over 7bn transactions each year. Competition will be "high on the agenda" [...]
FCA confirms new rules for payday lenders February 28, 2014 The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has this morning confirmed the new rules it's imposing on payday lenders and debt management companies. The rules respond to persistent calls from government and third sector groups to regulate the industry and drive out unscrupulous lenders. The clampdown on the consumer credit market, which is worth £200bn a year, [...]
FCA slaps ban on ex-CIB Partners chief February 27, 2014 The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has banned Arnold Eber, the former chief executive officer of the now-dissolved CIB Partners, from performing any function that relates to any regulated activity in the financial services industry. The regulator found that Eber “lacked integrity”, giving the impression in his conduct that certain bonds were soundly backed assets, when [...]