HM Treasury has recently announced the appointment of Ashley Alder as the new Chair of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). Ashley is currently Chief Executive Officer of the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) in Hong Kong, a role he has held since 2011. Ashley also chairs the Board of the International Organisation of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) and sits on the Financial Stability Board’s Plenary and its Steering Committee. Ashley began his career as a lawyer in London in 1984 and practised in Hong Kong for more than 20 years. He was Executive Director of the SFC’s Corporate Finance Division from 2001 to 2004, before returning to private practice at Herbert Smith LLP, a law firm, as Head of Asia. Continue reading…

The FCA has fined Ghana International Bank Plc (GIB) £5,829,900 for poor anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing controls over its correspondent banking activities. GIB provided correspondent banking services to overseas banks. This allowed them to provide products and services they would not otherwise be able to, including making payments in different currencies and across borders. The FCA requires banks to do extra checks on their correspondent banking customers to reduce the higher risk of money laundering and terrorist financing associated with the service.  Continue reading…

The National Bank of Belgium (NBB) is to support the European Commission in funding the important NextGenerationEU recovery plan. The Commission has decided to call on the NBB’s market infrastructure and expertise for issuance of the massive package of bonds worth over € 800 billion. During the coronavirus crisis the European Commission decided to support the Member States with an extensive recovery package to make the Union greener, healthier, more digital and more resilient. The package is called NextGenerationEU and will be funded by resources made available by the issuance of debt securities with a maturity of three months to thirty years. Altogether the investment programme amounts to over € 800 billion. The European Commission decided to call on the European Central Bank and the National Bank of Belgium for the issuance of these bonds. While the ECB will act as the payment bank the NBB will arrange the issuance of the bonds through its securities settlement system. Continue reading…

In its flagship economic report, the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) said the global economy risks entering a new era of high inflation. Stagflation dangers loom large, as a combination of lingering disruptions from the pandemic, the war in Ukraine, soaring commodity prices and financial vulnerabilities cloud the outlook. According to the BIS’s Annual Economic Report 2022, the priority for central banks is to restore low and stable inflation. In doing so, they should seek to minimise the hit to economic activity, thereby safeguarding financial stability. Engineering such a “soft landing” has historically been difficult, and the starting conditions today make it challenging, the BIS said. Continue reading…

Two of the United Kingdom’s most senior ministers have resigned from the cabinet in the latest blow to Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s leadership. Health Minister Sajid Javid and Finance Minister Rishi Sunak announced their resignations within minutes of each other on Tuesday, plunging Johnson’s government into crisis. The resignations came as Johnson was apologising for what he said was a mistake for not realising that a former minister in charge of pastoral care was unsuitable for a job in government after complaints of sexual misconduct were made against him, in the latest embarrassment to have engulfed his government. In their resignation letters to the prime minister, both ministers took aim at Johnson’s ability to run an administration that adhered to standards. Continue reading…

Almost half of firms (44%) are planning to invest more in RegTech solutions in the next 12 months to cope with the growing pressure on the compliance function in this fast moving and increasingly complicated regulatory and operational landscape. A further 41% expect to invest the same amount as the previous 12 months. This investment is driving up the overall cost of compliance with almost all (90%) of financial services firms reporting increased compliance costs over the past five years. One in ten said costs have doubled. This was discovered by compliance technology and data analytics firm SteelEye, in its first-ever Annual Compliance Health Check Report. Continue reading…

On 30 June, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision issued a second public consultation on the prudential treatment of banks’ cryptoasset exposures. The basic structure of the proposal in the first consultation is maintained, with cryptoassets divided into two broad groups: Group 1 includes those eligible for treatment under the existing Basel Framework with some modifications. Group 2 includes unbacked cryptoasset and stablecoins with ineffective stabilisation mechanisms, which are subject to a new conservative prudential treatment. Continue reading…

Debt financing can spur economic growth but may also pose risks to financial stability and macroeconomic performance. Private non-financial sector debt increased to an all-time high of around 170% of world GDP during the Covid-19 pandemic, spotlighting the role of debt in supporting economic activity as well as the associated risks. Central bank frameworks for monitoring debt vulnerabilities were strengthened in the years prior to the Covid-19 crisis. Central banks have made increasing use of sectoral and entity-level data to look beneath aggregate figures that might conceal vulnerabilities; the distribution’s tail often provides a better signal of debt vulnerabilities than the middle. Continue reading…

On 20 May 2022, Charles Randell, Chair of the Financial Conduct Authority, delivered a speech at the Centre for Commercial Law Studies, Queen Mary University of London, England. Meeting people across the nations and regions of the United Kingdom is the greatest privilege of my job as Chair of the Financial Conduct Authority. In Solihull, I met a single mother. When her father was dying, she gave up her job to care for him. She couldn’t meet her everyday costs and started taking on debt. She did seek help – but at her lowest ebb, she was sold a plan that charged her fees but didn’t reduce the debt. It didn’t even leave her enough money for food. It was only when she went to the voluntary sector – in her case, Christians Against Poverty – that she started to turn the corner. She got a new plan which meant she could keep her home. Continue reading…

The European Banking Authority (EBA) recently published its Guidelines specifying the role and responsibilities of the anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) compliance officer and of the management body of credit or financial institutions. These Guidelines aim to ensure a common interpretation and adequate implementation of AML/CFT internal governance arrangements across the EU in line with the requirements of the EU Directive on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purposes of money laundering or terrorist financing (ML/FT).  Continue reading…