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The UK’s financial guard is intended to abandon its controversial “name and shame” plan. More companies investigating them, marking a major turnaround after the regulator faced prefabricated pressure to miss politics.
The financial conduct authority plans to announce on Wednesday that its proposal for applying a new A public interest test On whether to detect more companies under investigation, according to people familiar with this issue. Instead, it sticks to the existing tighter test “Exceptional circumstances”.
It is a significant turnaround for the UK regulator, which has sparked heavy reaction from the city and criticism from government officials when announcing plans in February 2024.
Nickil Rati, Chief Executive Officer of FCA, was on fire for the proposal in times of increased concern that the regulator’s proposals are driving a business abroad At a time when the government is trying to increase growth.
The government has prompted many regulators of the country to present more growth proposals. On Tuesday, Sir Kir Starmer said he decided an ax regulator of payment systems By joining it with FCA.
It comes a few weeks after ministers throw out Chairman of the Competition and Market Authority, after deciding it is insufficiently focused on growth.
Comes u-turn Despite the assurances From the FA that the narrow parameters would be applied to which investigations would be released by measuring the impact on the company under a magnifying glass.
In November, FCA responded to criticism of her suggestions to reveal more than the companies investigating them, saying it would give companies 10 days of notice instead of just one and take into account the impact on the company, its stock price and wider financial stability.
It is also said that the new policy will lead to another or two investigations of regulated companies to be discovered each year, at the top of one or two already.
CCA organized a call on Tuesday with industry bodies to inform them of its plans and said it would inform the Committee on the Ministry of Finance of the Commons House and the Committee on the Financial Services of the Lords House Regulations, according to people, informed about the conversation.
FA has declined to comment.
The Lords Committee criticized the plan last month, calling it a “failed failure” in the episode of bruises for FCA. Lord Michael Forsit, a conservative chairman of the Committee, said the regulator had failed to make the case for “such a fundamental change”.
FA will continue to publicly name the unregulated companies he is investigating, which he said has widespread support in financial services, as well as confirming investigations if they have already been discovered by other public bodies, people say.
Senior CCA officials have earlier said they wanted to be able to name companies being investigated to prevent more customer damage, while the investigation is ongoing, as it has occurred in cases such as the British Steel Pension Council Council misunderstanding a scandal.
Two -thirds of the CCA investigations have ended without any implementation activities, raising concerns that it can harm companies’ reputation by discovering their identity, even if the investigation does not find something bad.
But regulators have tried to raise the bar needed to open an investigation. Since April 2023
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