Regulation

House of Commons Treasury Committee
Future of Financial Services Enquiry
Consultation Response

A ShareSoc news item by ShareSoc Director Cliff Weight ShareSoc and UKSA submitted a joint response on 19th February 2021. In summary we said: A long history of regulatory failures demonstrates serious deficiencies in the way financial services are currently regulated. The UK’s departure from the EU means that the UK can now set its own financial services rules, untrammelled by the views of 27 other countries. We believe that major changes are required, particularly in the following areas: Making the best ...
Post Date: February 27, 2021 Read more

HM Treasury Financial Services
Future Regulatory Framework Review
Phase II Consultation Response

A ShareSoc news item by ShareSoc Director Cliff Weight The fundamentals of financial regulation are under question Recent regulatory failures (for example Woodford, the mis-selling of mini-bonds peddled by London & Capital Finance, Wellesley, and the failure to protect pensioners being pressured by advice on pension transfers from commissioned agents) have forced a welcome review of current practice. ShareSoc and UKSA are responding to make sure the interests of ordinary savers and investors are properly safeguarded. Two separate consultations are in progress, for HM ...
Post Date: February 27, 2021 Read more

Forward Selling: A Crime Against Shareholders?

Roger has recently written about the censure of Cornhill Capital, in the matter of New World Oil & Gas. The full censure notice, setting out the gory details of the case has been published here: http://www.londonstockexchange.com/traders-and-brokers/rules-regulations/change-and-updates/stock-exchange-notices/2017/n0117.pdf This case centres around the practice of "forward selling", a practice which is not unusual at present. So, what is forward selling? Forward selling occurs when a company agrees to issue shares to a third party and that third party sells those shares in the market, prior ...
Post Date: January 21, 2017 Read more

Trusting the regulators? You should not.

The recent case of Catalyst Investment Group highlights the fact that sensible investors should not rely on the financial regulators to warn them about dubious investments and those who promote them. Indeed so far as the FCA, and its predecessor the FSA, is concerned, the fact that a business is regulated by them does not necessarily mean they are trustworthy at all. All it means is that they have met the regulatory requirements at some point in the past.The recent outrageous ...
Post Date: October 21, 2013 Read more

EuroFinuse attacks lack of retail investor representation

Guillaume Prache of EuroFinuse (of which ShareSoc is a member) has been attacking the lack of adequate retail investor representation on European bodies that devise financial market regulations. Specifically he has attacked the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) and its Securities and Markets Stakeholder Group where only a few of the 30 members on the committees are consumer advocates (i.e. retail investors). He complains the big banks are dominating policy development on European financial market regulations which of course now ...
Post Date: August 28, 2013 Read more