Tuesday 5 March 2013

UK: Transparency and the Financial Conduct Authority

On 1 April this year the new Financial Conduct Authority comes into existence. Section 6(1) of the Financial Services Act 2012 amends the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 and sets out how the FCA will be created: the body corporate known as the Financial Services Authority will be renamed the Financial Conduct Authority. Section 6(1) also sets out the regulatory principles to which the FCA (and the new Prudential Regulation Authority) must have regard in the discharge of their general functions. Included in the list of principles are the following:
  • The desirability in appropriate cases of each regulator publishing information relating to persons on whom requirements are imposed by or under this Act, or requiring such persons to publish information, as a means of contributing to the advancement by each regulator of its objectives.
  • Regulators should exercise their functions as transparently as possible.
In respect of these two principles the Financial Services Authority has published a consultation paper the purpose of which is to begin a discussion regarding the information that the FCA and firms should release: see here (pdf).

No comments: