The Hong Kong Payment Systems and Stored Value Facilities Ordinance (the Ordinance) came into effect on 13 November 2015. The Ordinance aims to minimise and manage the risks associated with payments through stored value facilities (SVFs). It does this by ensuring the… Read more

New Market Abuse powers for the FCA (2) Powers to require information from issuers, PDMRs and persons closely associated to PDMRs The Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Market Abuse) Regulations 2016 (the "regulations") were passed to ensure that UK law… Read more

Investment recommendations Increased scope The former Market Abuse Directive (MAD) imposed requirements designed to ensure the objective presentation of investment recommendations and the disclosure of interests and conflicts of interest on the part of producers or disseminators of such recommendations. … Read more

Summary A recent Hong Kong judgment highlights the importance of ensuring due process when regulators exchange information with each other. Regulatory confidentiality In the UK a statement made to an investigator appointed by the FCA or PRA in compliance with… Read more

With just under 5 weeks to go before the Market Abuse Regulation comes into application across the EU, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) on Monday clarified that the obligations to detect and report market abuse under Article 16(2)… Read more

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) announced this week that it has withdrawn approval from the Singapore branch of an international bank due to serious breaches of anti-money laundering (AML) requirements, poor management oversight, and gross misconduct by certain bank staff.… Read more

The High Court has found that the requirement of reasonableness imposed by the Unfair Contract Terms Act 1977 (UCTA) can apply in circumstances where a party's written standard terms and conditions are incorporated only in part and other terms are… Read more

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has today issued a circular requiring Hong Kong-regulated institutions to implement the HKMA's "Cybersecurity Fortification Initiative" (the Initiative), which consists of three distinct pillars: (1) risk assessment, (2) training and (3) intelligence sharing. The… Read more

This will be our last quarterly Market Abuse update before 3 July 2016, the date when both the new Market Abuse Regulation and the Criminal Sanctions (Market Abuse) Directive come into application across Europe. Some significant pieces of the regulatory… Read more

Six months after the High Court's surprising judgment in Suremime Limited v Barclays Bank plc [2015] EWHC 2277 (QB), the recent decision in CGL Group Limited v Royal Bank of Scotland [2016] EWHC 281 (QB) will be encouraging for financial… Read more

The SFC issued a circular to all licensed corporations yesterday, following its recent review of cybersecurity within selected larger licensed corporations.  Firms will wish to give careful consideration to the SFC's recommendations regarding appropriate cyberscurity controls. ... Read more

The Securities Financing Transactions Regulation (SFTR) entered into force on 12 January 2016.  The SFTR has a broad scope with extraterritorial and retrospective reach, and impacts on both EU and non-EU financial and non-financial counterparties.  All firms involved in securities… Read more

After almost four years of debate, the European Commission, Parliament and Council finally reached political agreement on the proposed General Data Protection Regulation (the "GDPR") in December 2015. ... Read more

The European Banking Authority has published the final version of its updated guidelines on the CRDIV remuneration requirements. ... Read more

In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court has confirmed that the right to draw down under loan agreements is caught by the expanded definition of "asset" contained in the current standard Commercial Court form of freezing order which includes "any… Read more

In a note published last week, ratings agency Standard & Poors (S&P) said it viewed banks as natural targets facing a high threat of cyber-risk, although it considered the global credit risk of a cyber attack to be only medium, because it… Read more

The PRA is consulting on a draft statement of policy setting out its approach to ring-fencing transfer schemes (RFTS), and the FCA on guidance. ... Read more

The recent Court of Appeal decision in Wood v Sureterm Direct Ltd & Capita Insurance Services Ltd [2015] EWCA Civ 839 gives further guidance on the use of business/commercial common sense as an aid to contractual construction. In reversing the… Read more

The recent and somewhat surprising decision of the High Court in Suremime Limited v Barclays Bank plc [2015] EWHC 2277 (QB) is important to any financial institution that has agreed to conduct an FCA past business review or redress exercise.… Read more

On 3 August, the UK Government launched what it described as a major new review to examine how financial advice could work better for consumers.  The review will consider: the “advice gap” for those who do not have significant wealth; the regulatory or… Read more

Two pilot schemes, the Shorter Trials Scheme and the Flexible Trials Scheme, will be introduced for claims commenced from 1 October and will run for a period of two years. The schemes allow for shorter and more flexible procedures for claims brought… Read more

The Consumer Credit Act 1974 From 1998 to 2008 the Consumer Credit Act 1974 only applied to agreements to lend consumers less than £25,000. The financial limit was removed completely in 2008. Over the period 1998-2015, however, some lenders did… Read more

In Gary Ronald Marshall v Barclays Bank plc [2015] EWHC 2000 (QB), the bank applied to strike out a claim against it for alleged mis-selling of an interest rate hedging product (or to obtain summary judgment),  the basis that the… Read more

In a landmark decision dated 18 June 2015, the German Federal Supreme Court (Bundesgerichtshof, "BGH") decided that pro-forma applications for conciliation (Güteverfahren) do not suspend the limitation period for misselling claims if the applications are too generic and do not… Read more

The Fair and Effective Markets Review (FEMR) has published its final report, setting out 21 recommendations to help restore trust in the wholesale Fixed Income, Currency and Commodity (FICC) markets.  The report follows the consultation which concluded on 30 January… Read more

The US Department of Justice's FIFA indictment may require certain banks to review any of their FIFA-related transactions, as well as test their compliance policies and procedures relating to compliance with know-your-customer and anti-money laundering laws.  The indictment says the facilities of 26… Read more

At this recent conference, held by Herbert Smith Freehills and attended by close to a hundred clients, we explored some key legal and compliance risks facing major corporates and how those risks can be mitigated. After opening remarks by dispute… Read more

In the years since the Lehmann collapse there is no doubt that firms have been heavily focussed on CASS compliance, particularly on operational detail and accuracy. But last week's record CASS fine is a reminder of the critical need to understand,… Read more

The FCA and HM Treasury have published the first set of papers on the UK implementation of MiFID II: FCA discussion paper "Developing our approach to implementing MiFID II conduct of business and organisational requirements" (DP15/3); and HM Treasury consultation… Read more

Proposed guidelines from the European Banking Authority (EBA) would extend the "bankers' bonus cap" to all IFPRU investment firms as well as all banks, irrespective of size – this may include asset managers, hedge funds, broker-dealers, and spread-betting, FX and… Read more