Enforcement
The Upper Tribunal has agreed that restrictions the FCA placed upon e-money firm Navayo should not be suspended. Firms are reminded of the FCA’s “expectation that all firms have systems and controls in place to combat the risk that they may be used for financial crime purposes”.
A request from the FCA has led to the suspension of Guaranteed Asset Protection insurance by a number of insurance firms. The firms concerned make up 80% of the GAP market.
The product covers the difference between a vehicle’s purchase price or outstanding finance and its current market value, in the event it is written off before finance has been repaid.
Sheldon Mills, Executive Director of Consumers and Competition, said: ‘GAP insurance can provide a useful service to customers, but in its current form it does not offer fair value and we want to see improvements.”
The scheme under which Link Fund Solutions will make payments to creditors has been given legal approval and will go ahead as soon as possible if there is no appeal lodged. Investors voted to support the scheme.
Rules and consultations
Feedback on how the FCA is regulating the industry is being sought from a sample of 25,000 flexible firms in this year’s FCA and Practitioner Panel survey. The exercise is being carried out by Verlan (formerly Kantar Public) and the survey is shorter than in previous years. Results will be presented in the Summer.
Speeches and media
Clare Cole, director of market oversight, gave a speech at the Westminster Business Forum on the UK listings regime and the next steps in the process of reforming it. She described the FCA’s proposals as “the most wide-ranging reforms to the UK’s capital markets in over three decades”, aimed at encouraging “ a more diverse range of companies to list and grow”.
She described the proposals as “addressing the sources of friction and inefficiency in our listing rules”. And she went on to stress that greater responsibility would accompany increased choice and agility, saying that: “Investors must be prepared to exercise the powers at their disposal to hold the companies they own to account.”
Cole was also keen to emphasise that the proposals – which she said were “focussed on putting the choice back to issuers, investors, and markets, rather than the regulator” – were part of a bigger picture. She referred to six engagement papers addressing various aspects of the UK’s prospectus and public offer infrastructure.
Mark Francis, director of wholesale and unauthorised business investigations, published a blog headlined Shifting the dial on financial crime requires a collective push. He identified four areas of focus. They are;
- making better use of data and technology;
- improving information sharing;
- improving consumer awareness;
- developing a robust metrics framework to measure success.
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Jamie Bell, the FCA’s head of secondary markets oversight, took part in a fireside chat at Global Relay, during which he explained the regulator’s approach and took questions from an audience of over 140 compliance professionals.
