The House of Lords Financial Services Regulation Committee has published a letter from Nikhil Rathi on the lessons the FCA has learned in relation to publishing enforcement investigations.
Broadly, the FCA was surprised at the strength of feeling against its original proposals for publicising its intentions, both because of the long-standing numerous requests for it to be more transparent and because it did not expect industry to view the consultation as an “end point”. But, in retrospect, it say it could have engaged more with various groups before it published the consultation, and this could have helped shape its approach. It also now appreciates that the way it phrased the proposals gave the impression it wanted a fundamental change in approach, and that it failed to stress that it only ever expected a few additional proactive announcements would happen.
Between 3 June 2025 and 30 April 2026, the FCA opened 33 enforcement operations, of which it has announced 5 on a named basis (3 reactively and 2 based on the “exceptional circumstances” test), and 2 anonymously. The two anonymous ones, it says, might have been named had it introduced its proposed “public interest” test.