FSA to pledge cut in
red tape for small firms
The
Scotsman - Edinburgh,Scotland,UK
JOHN Tiner, the battle-scarred chief executive of the Financial Services
Authority, will launch a fightback this week by pledging to cut the cost
of regulation ...
'Inquisitors'
and 'gangsters': City watchdog savaged by splits ...
Independent
- UK
... Callum McCarthy, chairman of the FSA, had previously
told a parliamentary committee that City firms had committed financial crimes
in managing splits. ...
Ex-legal
chief attacks 'selective' FSA
The Times
- UK
... in the statement was that the FSA was 75 per cent vindicated, Mr Blair said, while in reality the figure was more like 40 per cent, with L&G having the edge. ...
A
hero - or a zero?
This is
Money - UK
PEOPLE who buy financial products are forever being told that they enjoy
gold-plated protection in the form of the Financial Ombudsman Service.
...
The
FSA on trial
Telegraph.co.uk
- London,England,UK
Grant Ringshaw talks to L&G's head, David Prosser. ...
However, the tribunal also said it is highly likely to reduce the £1.1m fine
slapped on L&G by the FSA. ...
Our
financial watchdog is given a bloody nose, but still won't say ...
Telegraph.co.uk
- London,England,UK
... It turned out that L&G's record was better than that of
many of its peers. She didn't apologise. Coincidentally, or not, L&G
was ...
Split-cap
broker and the secret meeting of the 'magic circle'
Independent
- UK
... Now the hot air that was talked [by the FSA] - 'oh, this was
collusion, these were people agreeing to support each other's issues [of new
funds]' - nonsense ...
Industry watchdog will have to tread
lightly in wake of L&G win ...
Sunday
Herald - Glasgow,Scotland,UK
... L&G appealed to the Financial Services and Market Tribunal
because it believed the FSA had unfairly accused it of the widespread mis-selling
of mortgage-linked ...
L&G
criticism forces watchdog to hold enforcement review
Financial
Times - UK
The Financial Services Authority is to embark on a review
of its enforcement procedures following criticism this week over its handling
of the mis-selling case ...
THE implications of this week’s Financial Services and
Markets Tribunal ruling that the FSA did overstep the mark in five out of 13
sample endowment cases will have far-reaching consequences.
We will have to wait and see what if anything the other
financial institutions that have been fined by the FSA will do, although it is
seems highly unlikely the regulator would give back the millions some of them
have paid in mis-selling fines.
However, calls for the FSA’s regulatory decisions
committee to be abolished have already begun.
Evan Owen, of the IFA Defence Union, said: "We will
ask for the regulatory decisions committee to be abolished and replaced by a
truly independent arbitration service that has the resources and time to
consider the evidence supplied by the defendant."
Owen also wants an automatic right to legal council for defendants when disputes arise in future. If an independent service proves too costly, Owen believes disputes should go straight to the FSMA Tribunal, and that the Financial Ombudsman Service be brought with in for points of law.
Soapbox
Evan Owen
WHETHER you think the FSA’s employees have sufficient understanding
of what they are looking for during investigations depends on whether you think
they reach the correct conclusions and then make sensible press statements.
I don’t. When asked how many experienced staff they have
on board, the FSA says 50 per cent of its new recruits have some financial
services industry background, does that include working in a call centre? The
other 50 per cent are imports from the Bank of England, the Department of Trade
and Industry and the Treasury as well as the Government actuarial department -
box-ticking civil servants who understand nothing of the complex financial
services world and have no inclination to do any swotting beyond their decision
trees, consultations and "policy" making.
Better not to have a regulator at all than to have one
that is counter-productive, scares the public and the industry and then fines
innocent shareholders.
One of the drawbacks of the FSA is that it inhibits the
regulation of the marketplace in which litigation is designed to take effect -
and does - in other fields. For example, how many split capital investors have
been waiting for the FSA to get them compensation and, now that it has (mostly)
failed, will find their claims statute barred by the passage of time?
Thousands, I’ll be bound. Yet the same investors, if they had purchased as many
dud cars, would be into their solicitors’ offices PDQ, with their domestic
legal expenses policies to pay for the legal work.
The FSA raises expectations it can’t meet and in
attempting to meet them, it is oppressive and destructive. The FSA has
"objectives" so where is this "confidence" in the UK market
system? Where is this "public understanding of the financial system"?
When are we ever going to see "the right degree of protection for consumers"?
I would argue that all we will see under the current
regime is a decline in confidence of both the consumer and the supplier.
Evan Owen is a founder of the IFA Defence Union, a group which represents the interest of independent financial advisors
Little bonus cheer over endowments
LINDSEY ROGERSON
THE new year will not bring new cheer for beleaguered
endowment policyholders, according to the actuarial profession. It is
predicting little joy for homeowners in this year’s with-profits bonus season.
Norwich Union is the first of the big insurers to unveil
its 2005 bonus, on 18 January. In the past, policyholders at mutuals have
faired better than those at listed companies, although last year Standard
Life’s payouts to longstanding customers were half those received by
policyholders of similar endowments just a few years earlier.
Even at the reduced level, however, they were still
substantially above those of competitor insurers. But the Edinburgh mutual has
warned policyholders that they should not expect such superior returns in
future.
Nigel Masters, chairman of the actuarial profession’s Life
Board, said: "Policyholders are seeing the results of lower returns in
terms of reduced bonuses now and, in all likelihood, for several years to come.
This is a reflection of the lower returns available from stock markets and
other investments."
He believes that the trend towards lower bonus payouts was
further exacerbated by life companies being forced to sell equities over 2002-3
in order to meet the FSA’s strict solvency requirements.
But the actuarial profession believes that the worst may now be over for those with shorter-terms policies, such as for ten years. Evan Owen, of the IFS Defence Union, says evidence is emerging that some policyholders who have been sent red warning letters will be sitting on a tidy profit when their policies mature this year. He cites one client who was warned of a shortfall £4,100 but who received £1,560 more than the £38,000 the policy was geared to pay out.
Is it lawful? An FOI request from the IFA Defence Union
THE Financial Services Authority has had its first request for hitherto undisclosed information under the Freedom of Information Act. It comes from an organisation that claims to speak for downtrodden independent financial advisers and was filed, with a clear head, the person responsible insists, at 10am on New Year’s Day.
The body wants to see the legal opinion used to decide that the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (FSMA) was compatible with the Human Rights Act 1998, and in particular, the opinion relied on by Gordon Brown at the time. The applicant does not much care for the FSMA, which empowers the regulator.
The FSA has two weeks to give a view. So far, the classic “We’ll let you know” message has gone out, pointing out that there are various exemptions “which may prevent release of the information you have requested”. Hard to see how counsel’s opinions on an Act of Parliament can be confidential.
Settlement - of sorts - for split
capital investors
LINDSEY ROGERSON
PERSONAL FINANCE EDITOR
SOME 40,000 investors look set to benefit from a fund set up
to compensate victims of the split capital investment trust fiasco.
Although some investors have expressed annoyance that the
firms involved have not had to admit any wrongdoing in the deal brokered by the
Financial Services Authority, it is not just consumers who are annoyed. One
leading industry group, the IFA Defence Union, dubbed the whole settlement a
"cop out".
The total compensation fund is more than £100 million
short of what the FSA set out to get and less than a third of the £700m the
Association of Investment Trust Companies estimates investors lost. Worse
still, investors will have to wait till the back-end of 2005 for compensation.
However, not every split cap investor will be able to make
a claim as the fund covers only investors in the 18 signatory companies
invested in Zero dividend preference shares or unit trusts and financial
products heavily exposed to Zeros.
The FSA has set aside £143m of the £194m in a general
compensation fund. Investors have to have lost more than £250 to be eligible,
but they don’t have to still own the offending split - just to have owned it
between 1 July, 2000 and 30 June, 2002. A full list of eligible funds is
available on the FSA’s website.
Investors will have to decide whether the payout they are
likely to get from the fund would be more than they would get from pursuing a
complaint, as any payout from the fund will be a "full and final
settlement of any claim". Additionally, while those who may have received
compensation elsewhere will be able to make a claim on the fund, any monies
received will have to be declared.
For the 10,000 investors in the four companies who failed
to sign up to the compensation fund - Exeter Fund Managers, BC Asset
Management, BFS and Teather & Greenwood - other avenues of complaint and
possible financial redress do exist.
Investors who received advice before buying splits can
complain to the Financial Ombudsman Service if they believe the stockbroker,
portfolio manager or IFA who advised them, did not advise them of the risks of
investing in this type of vehicle.
Similarly, those who bought on the basis of marketing
literature that classified splits as "low risk" or likened the risk
of investing in them to that of having cash in a savings account, may have
grounds for complaint - but the marketing must have referred to a specific
split capital product. Finally, investors have the option to sue through the
courts.
Those who think they can claim on the fund should call
0845 606 6389 or visit www.funddistribution.org.
Those seeking further information should call the FSA’s
consumer helpline on 0845 606 1234. Those who have made a complaint to the
Financial Ombudsman Service can call 0207 093 7000 or visit www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/faq/splits2.htm
If the firm that advised or sold you a split no longer exists, call the Financial Services Compensation Scheme on 020 7892 7300 or visit it at www.fscs.org.uk