Financial Services UK

  • September 05, 2024

    FRC Warns Against Misuse Of Offsetting Financial Data

    Companies that record a gain which nullifies the effect of its entry into their balance sheets — a practice known as offsetting — have caused "material errors" in their financial statements, Britain's accounting watchdog said Thursday.

  • September 05, 2024

    CVC Raises €7.4B Of Capital In 1st Results After Listing

    European private equity firm CVC Capital Partners PLC said Thursday that it has raised €7.4 billion ($8.2 billion) in fresh capital during the first six months of 2024 as it published its first set of results since its €2 billion flotation in Amsterdam.

  • September 04, 2024

    FCA Tells Banks To Protect Customers From Being Debanked

    Banks must do more to ensure consumers are not being denied accounts unfairly, the Financial Conduct Authority said Wednesday.

  • September 04, 2024

    BNP Paribas Seeks To Move VietJet Litigation To UK

    BNP Paribas SA has pushed to move a claim filed by VietJet Aviation to the English courts, arguing that disputes over their financial agreements with the Vietnamese low-cost airline belong in England, not Vietnam.

  • September 04, 2024

    Pension Pot Needs For 'Basic' Retirement Rose 60% In 3 Years

    Pensioners need 60% more retirement savings to meet basic costs compared to just three years ago, according to a think tank's research published Wednesday.

  • September 11, 2024

    Hausfeld Snaps Up Litigation Pro From Covington In London

    Hausfeld LLP has hired a partner from Covington & Burling LLP in London to boost its profile in commercial disputes, after its office in the U.K. capital recently underwent changes in leadership.

  • September 04, 2024

    Cap On Push-Payment Fraud Payouts To Plummet To £85K

    The payments watchdog said Wednesday that it plans to cut the cap on compulsory reimbursement by companies of authorized push payment fraud from £415,000 ($546,000) to £85,000.

  • September 04, 2024

    Fraud, Scam Complaints Reach Highest-Ever Level

    Fraud complaints in the U.K. reached a record high with 8,734 cases reported between April and June, according to data from the Financial Ombudsman Service published Wednesday.

  • September 03, 2024

    Tech Co. Accused Of Defrauding 'Plasma Reactor' Investor

    A Chinese businessman and his company have sued a U.K. technology company claiming they were defrauded of nearly £2.9 million ($3.8 million) by the firm and its directors after being led under false pretenses into investing in the development of a so-called "plasma reactor."

  • September 03, 2024

    CMA Clears Tate & Lyle Sugar Biz Deal

    Britain's competition authority said Tuesday it has now cleared Tate & Lyle's planned purchase of sugar producer Tereos' U.K. business, as the unit was at risk of shutting down without the deal, which would lead to reduced competition in the industry anyway.

  • September 03, 2024

    SFO Seizes Watches Worth £500K In £76M Fraud Probe

    Serious Fraud Office investigators seized watches on Tuesday from a suspect arrested in a £76 million ($100 million) investment fraud probe into the collapse of a luxury care home provider in 2019.

  • September 03, 2024

    BBVA Gets UK Regulatory OK For €12B Bid For TSB Owner

    Spanish lending giant BBVA said Tuesday the U.K.'s Prudential Regulation Authority has given the approval for it to indirectly acquire control of British-based TSB Bank PLC as part of its €12 billion ($13.3 billion) hostile takeover bid of rival Banco de Sabadell.

  • September 03, 2024

    Bahamian Bank Hit With $15M Claim Over Loan Deal Breach

    The director of a U.S. biotech company has filed a $15 million legal claim against a Bahamian bank, as he accused it of improperly terminating a $3 million loan agreement because of several defaults.

  • September 03, 2024

    Half Of Women Unsure They Will Have Enough For Retirement

    More than half of women in Britain do not believe they will have enough money to support their income in retirement, findings by an investment management company suggest, amid concerns over the gender pension gap.

  • September 03, 2024

    Pay To Play: The 2-Tier Legal Route For Crypto-Fraud Victims

    More people are falling victim to cryptocurrency scams, but their options for recovering money are few and expensive, which creates a two-tier approach — one for those who have the means to pay lawyers and consultants and another for those who don't.

  • September 03, 2024

    Port Operator Disputes $2M Claim For Unpaid Fees

    English port operator Freetown Terminal Holding has denied that it owes a Swiss consultancy $2 million in unpaid fees tied to shareholders' dividends, saying that their agreement had been terminated before the payouts were made.

  • September 02, 2024

    Simpson Thacher-Led Blackstone Inks €1B Property Deal

    Blackstone Inc. is snapping up an 80% holding in a portfolio of European properties valued at approximately €1 billion ($1.1 billion), seller Burstone Group Ltd. said Monday, with Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP advising the asset management giant.

  • September 09, 2024

    A&O Shearman Hires PE Pros From Sidley Austin In London

    A&O Shearman LLP said Monday it has secured a double-hire from Sidley Austin LLP in London as the firm expands its global private equity practice.

  • September 02, 2024

    OFSI To Bring 1st Penalty For Sanctions Violation This Year

    Britain's sanctions enforcer will bring the first penalty for breaching the banning rules later this year as the agency looks to crack down on Russian oligarchs whose assets have been frozen since the invasion of Ukraine, a senior Treasury official said Monday.

  • September 02, 2024

    Greensill, Gupta Deny Conspiracy In Zurich Insurance Row

    Financier Lex Greensill and steel magnate Sanjeev Gupta have denied conspiring to deceive underwriters at insurance giant Zurich over allegedly fake debts, amid a $400 million court battle in London over trade credit insurance. 

  • September 02, 2024

    Manolete Wins Nearly £1M Over Director's Breach Of Duties

    An insolvency litigation financing company has secured a victory worth £918,590 ($1.2 million) against the former director of Just Recruit Group Ltd. after a court found that he had breached his duties during the financial collapse of the business.

  • September 02, 2024

    Tribunal Backs FCA In Denying Ashraf Wealth Management

    A London Tribunal upheld on Monday the Financial Conduct Authority's decision to deny authorization to Ashraf Wealth Management Ltd., after the regulator concluded its founder should not carry out regulated activities unsupervised.

  • September 02, 2024

    William Fry Guides Ireland In AIB's €500M Buyback

    Allied Irish Banks said Monday that it plans to buy back €500 million ($550 million) of its shares from the Irish state to reduce its crisis-era bailout stake in the lender after it disclosed "a very strong first half" of the year.

  • September 02, 2024

    EU Asset Managers Seek Strong Governance On Data Feeds

    A trade body for European asset managers called on Monday for strong governance of providers of consolidated tapes, which set out prices and volumes of shares and bonds in bloc-wide feeds for investors.

  • August 30, 2024

    UK's Labour Gov't Urged To Raise Capital Gains Tax

    The Labour government is facing calls to raise the capital gains tax despite financial firms advising investors to sell off their assets or even leave the United Kingdom over the possible tax hike.

Expert Analysis

  • German Competition Law May Herald New Enforcement Trend

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    The recent amendment to the German Act against Restraints of Competition is expected to significantly expand the powers of the German Federal Cartel Office, and could signal a global trend toward greater direct intervention by national competition authorities and political interference in competition law, say lawyers at Simmons & Simmons.

  • New Financial Services Act Leaves Few Firms Untouched

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    The recently published Financial Services and Markets Act 2023, which replaces retained EU law with U.K. legislation, is one of the most significant pieces of post-Brexit regulation, with key practical implications for actors such as investment firms and crypto-asset and payment service providers, say Tim Cant, Emma Tran and Bisola Williams at Ashurst.

  • FCA 'De-Banking' Clampdown May Need Gov't Backing

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    The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority’s recent clampdown on unfair bank account closures will give customers greater transparency, but with terms usually skewed in the bank’s favor, it is a policy matter for the government to enact further protections for businesses and consumers, say Stephen Rosen and Jean-Martin Louw at Collyer Bristow.

  • UK Securitization Reform Opts For Modest Approach, For Now

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    Recently published consultation papers from the U.K. Prudential Regulation and Financial Conduct Authorities on new securitization rules mainly restate retained EU law, but there are some targeted adjustments being proposed and further divergence is to be expected, say Alix Prentice and Assia Damianova at Cadwalader.

  • Examining PayPal's Venture Into The Stablecoin Market

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    PayPal’s recent release of a stablecoin pegged to the U.S. dollar may represent a groundbreaking innovation or could fail as others have before it, and policymakers in the U.K. and the EU will be watching the impact of this new crypto token with a keen eye, say Ben Lee and Dion Seymour at Andersen.

  • High Court Dechert Ruling Offers Litigation Privilege Lessons

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    While the recent High Court ruling in Al Sadeq v. Dechert LLP, which concerned torture conspiracy allegations against the firm, held that litigation privilege can be claimed by a nonparty to proceedings, the exact boundaries of privilege aren't always clear-cut and may necessitate analyzing the underlying principles, says Scott Speirs at Norton Rose.

  • FCA Consumer Duty May Pose Enforcement Challenges

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    The new U.K. Financial Conduct Authority consumer duty sets higher standards of customer protection and transparency for financial services firms, but given the myriad products available across the sector, policing the regulations is going to be a challenging task, says Alessio Ianiello at Keller Postman.

  • UK Insolvency Reform Review Shows Measures Are Working

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    The U.K. Insolvency Service's recently published review of legislative reforms to the corporate insolvency regime demonstrates that despite being underutilized, the measures have been shown to help viable companies survive, and with the current difficult economic environment, will likely be an important aspect of organizational restructuring going forward, says Kirsten Fulton-Fleming at Taylor Wessing.

  • More UK Collective Actions On The Horizon After Forex Ruling

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    A U.K. appeals court's recent decision in Forex case Evans v. Barclays is likely to significantly widen the scope of opt-out collective proceedings that can be brought, paving the way for more class actions by prospective claimants who have previously been unable to bring individual claims, say Robin Henry and Tamara Davis at Collyer Bristow.

  • FCA Listing Reform Proposals Aim To Modernize UK Markets

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    The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority's recent proposals to reform listing rules will enhance equities while retaining protections and high governance standards, and will also make the capital markets work more efficiently and competitively with other global markets, say lawyers at Greenberg Traurig.

  • Takeaways From ICO's Action In NatWest Privacy Dispute

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    The U.K. Information Commissioner’s Office's latest intervention in the Nigel Farage NatWest Bank dispute highlights the importance of the legal responsibilities of all data processors in possession of sensitive information, and is a reminder that upholding bank customers' privacy rights is paramount, says James Kelliher at Keller Postman.

  • How The OECD Global Tax Proposal Could Affect M&A

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    Following agreement on the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s Pillar Two proposal to introduce a global minimum tax, domestic implementation is expected to have a significant impact on international M&A transactions, with financial modeling, deal structuring, risk allocation and joint venture arrangements likely to be affected, say lawyers at Freshfields.

  • How Russia Sanctions May Complicate Contract Obligations

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    Against the backdrop of recent comprehensive sanctions against Russia and Belarus, a review of recent U.K. case law clarifies that certain force majeure clauses likely cover trade sanctions, and that future litigation will further develop the scope of force majeure and frustration in the context of sanctions, says Frances Jenkins at Quillon Law.

  • New Guidance Offers Clarity For Charities On ESG Investing

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    The need for charities to understand investing in line with environmental, social and governance aspirations has never been more pressing, and recently updated U.K. Charity Commission guidance should give trustees confidence to make decisions that are right for their organization, says Robert Nieri at Shoosmiths.

  • US And EU Poised For Closer Ties In Tech Financial Market

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    The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and the European Commission are both concerned about the challenges posed by the increasing digitalization of financial products, such as the use of AI and new forms of credit, and by working together, the two regulators can share information and best practices, says Yulia Makarova at Cooley.

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