Focus Of FCA Business Plan: Oversight Of Appointed Representatives

(CTN News) – Earlier in this post, we discussed the FCA’s Business Plan for 2023/24. This plan reaffirms the FCA’s focus on reducing misconduct that causes serious harm.

It includes six specific commitments and related actions that the FCA will take over the next year to achieve this goal.

If you are a principal firm, an appointed representative (AR), or anyone thinking about starting a relationship with an AR, you might want to keep in mind the FCA’s ongoing commitment to improving AR oversight.

As a result, new rules will come into force in December 2022, which follows on from the implementation of new rules in December 2022 (see our posts here and here for a recap).

A new regime has been put in place that strengthens the responsibilities and expectations of the principal and imposes new requirements with regard to information.

Observations from the FCA’s Business Plan suggest that, unsurprisingly, the is keen to keep an eye on how the changes are playing out as they move forward.

Upon implementing the new rules, the FCA will,

according to the Business Plan, begin testing that firms are properly integrating the new rules into all areas of the AR regime in 2023/24.

Moreover, the FCA intends to continue to take advantage of the significantly improved data that is available to better target resources at the regulatory gateway, as well as to undertake a more assertive supervision of primary principals with high risk exposures.

Principal firms and ARs are also reminded that further possible legislative changes and policy interventions can occur in this area in addition to the implementation of the new rules.

The FCA continues to view the proper oversight of ARs by principal firms as a key area of concern for them.

There is, therefore, a very important requirement for the principal firms to ensure they have properly adapted to the new regime and stay tuned for any further developments.

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