Welcome to the August 2020 edition of our corporate crime update - our round up of developments in relation to corruption, money laundering, fraud, sanctions and related matters. Read more

In this blog post, we round-up forthcoming developments in financial services regulation in the UK and at EU and International levels which are coming up in August 2020.  Read more

On 15 July 2020, shortly after the first anniversary of its assumption of governorship of the Contingent Reimbursement Model (“CRM”) Code, the Lending Standards Board (LSB) launched a consultation which will form the basis of its post-implementation review of the CRM Code. The LSB’s review also extends to its Practitioners Guide (which is made available only to signatories of the CRM Code) and its Information for Customers document. Read more

The FCA recently issued its finalised guidance for payments and e-money firms on safeguarding customer funds and Covid-19. The guidance is designed to mitigate, in the short-term, concerns that some firms are not complying with the Payment Services Regulations 2017 (PSRs) and Electronic Money Regulations 2011 (EMRs) safeguarding rules in the way the FCA expects. It is also designed to help prevent potential harm to customers in the event of insolvencies caused by Covid-19. Read more

Following Covid-19, the message from the UK financial regulators regarding payments firms and payments innovation has stepped up. Recently, the Bank of England published a speech given by Christina Segal-Knowles (Executive Director, Financial Market Infrastructure Directorate) on 11 June in which she discussed the emerging themes and challenges for payments firms and payments innovation. Read more

The FCA has announced that it will be surveying the financial resilience of around 13,000 firms from across 15 sectors. Between the 4 and 8 June 2020, firms will be sent a short survey by email to complete. The survey is intended to help the FCA better understand the effects that the Covid-19 pandemic is having on the finances of the firms it regulates and better guide its supervisory actions. Read more

In this blog post, we round-up forthcoming developments in the UK and at EU and International levels in financial services regulation which are expected for June 2020. Read more

As consumers use cash to make payments less frequently, and fintech firms offer new forms of money and new ways to make payments, central banks globally are considering how they should respond and whether they too should innovate to meet new payment needs in an increasingly digital economy. Read more