Regulatory Watch – UK Edition – July/August 2020

As some firms return to work and others plan to introduce flexible working arrangements permanently, market conduct remains a key concern for many financial services firms. We explore the heightened risk areas, as well as the steps firms should be taking to ensure their market conduct control frameworks keep pace and evolve with the new ways of working.

In this issue of RegWatch, we also review the EBA’s ICT guidelines from a cyber risk perspective. The FCA confirmed it would comply with these guidelines in late June, a few days before the guidelines came into force. Given the distraction of COVID-19 before summer, we believe firms should ensure they have reviewed their compliance arrangements for ICT and cyber against these guidelines or take the time to do so now.

As always, a snapshot from LightHouse – our regulatory horizon scanning tool – is appended, setting out the regulatory news. We cover an extract of the material updates since our last publication in June.

If you have any comments, suggestions, or would like further details on any of the features included in this edition, please do not hesitate to contact me or the team.

Manmeet RANA
Partner Aurexia