The Treasury has published the Financial Services and Markets Bill, along with feedback on its recent Future Regulatory Framework consultations.
In his first Mansion House speech as chancellor, Nadhim Zahawi noted that the Financial Services and Markets Bill aims to tailor financial services regulation to UK markets and create a more competitive financial services sector in the UK after Brexit. He also said it implements the Future Regulatory Framework (FRF) Review, including reforms to Solvency II and the prospectus regime and the Wholesale Capital Markets review.
The Bill also, amongst other things, enables the UK government to ‘safely adopt cryptoassets’ and introduces growth and competitiveness as formal ‘secondary’ objectives of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA).
Zahawi also highlighted that the Bill introduces measures to increase the regulators’ accountability and relationship with government and stakeholders, as well as further powers for the government to intervene in financial regulation (in the public interest).
In particular, Zahawi noted that the Bill enables the government to:
reform Solvency II by, amongst other things, enabling UK insurers to invest in long-term assets, such as infrastructure;
reform the prospectus regime (as recommended by Lord Hill);
progress the Wholesale Capital Markets review, for example by removing EU rules on the double volume cap and the share trading obligation; and
protect access to cash.
Zahawi also covered further topics, such as the work of the Transition Plan Taskforce and the application of distributed ledger technology (DLT or ‘blockchain’) to sovereign debt issuance.
The government has also published feedback on the responses it received to the November 2021 consultation on its proposals for the regulatory regime, together with its feedback for the FRF for central counterparties and central securities depositories.
The Treasury has published the Financial Services and Markets Bill, along with feedback on its recent Future Regulatory Framework consultations.
In his first Mansion House speech as chancellor, Nadhim Zahawi noted that the Financial Services and Markets Bill aims to tailor financial services regulation to UK markets and create a more competitive financial services sector in the UK after Brexit. He also said it implements the Future Regulatory Framework (FRF) Review, including reforms to Solvency II and the prospectus regime and the Wholesale Capital Markets review.
The Bill also, amongst other things, enables the UK government to ‘safely adopt cryptoassets’ and introduces growth and competitiveness as formal ‘secondary’ objectives of the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA).
Zahawi also highlighted that the Bill introduces measures to increase the regulators’ accountability and relationship with government and stakeholders, as well as further powers for the government to intervene in financial regulation (in the public interest).
In particular, Zahawi noted that the Bill enables the government to:
reform Solvency II by, amongst other things, enabling UK insurers to invest in long-term assets, such as infrastructure;
reform the prospectus regime (as recommended by Lord Hill);
progress the Wholesale Capital Markets review, for example by removing EU rules on the double volume cap and the share trading obligation; and
protect access to cash.
Zahawi also covered further topics, such as the work of the Transition Plan Taskforce and the application of distributed ledger technology (DLT or ‘blockchain’) to sovereign debt issuance.
The government has also published feedback on the responses it received to the November 2021 consultation on its proposals for the regulatory regime, together with its feedback for the FRF for central counterparties and central securities depositories.
