Nov 19 – FCA Directory

In July 2018 the FCA consulted on the introduction of the Directory, a new public register which will make information available on individuals carrying out certain roles in financial services.  

Nov 19 – SM&CR Q&A updated

Further to our previous newsflash in September sharing AMI’s Senior Manager and Certification Regime FCA Q&A document, following recent discussions with the FCA, we are pleased to share an updated document that firms may find useful in their SMCR preparations.  

Oct 19 – The bigger ticking bombs

The housing market appears stable, with forecasts suggesting that transactions will reach 1.2 million in 2019, in line with the long-term average. However, according to analysis by Zoopla and Hometrack, activity in the market is not evenly spread geographically.  Sales volumes in the South East and London, where house prices are high and stamp duty […]

Oct 19 – Picking the right remedies

The FCA is due to deliver final remedies from its Mortgages Market Study in Q4, unanticipated events notwithstanding. AMI has already been vocal about a wholesale move to allow execution-only sales to re-enter the mainstream market.  It is a mistake, and one that risks the FCA’s own Mortgage Market Rules on advice being gamed. AMI […]

Sept 19 – SM&CR Q&A

Further to our previous newsflash in July introducing AMI’s Senior Manager and Certification Regime guides and support,

Sept 19 – Who is Sonia

Lenders are currently heavily involved in making plans for the abolition of LIBOR, however this may come as a bit of a surprise to intermediaries.  The lack of public utterances so far masks a vast raft of work going on in the background.  For many they will replace this with SONIA as the alternative market […]

Sept 19 – Fearful of FOS

The Financial Ombudsman Service is obliged to publish decisions which have been referred to an Ombudsman.  Firms should be looking at its website and searching for mortgage based decisions to update themselves on issues which might arise from the approach being taken. We have looked at four recent decisions with three of those decided in […]

Aug 19 – A fairer FOS

FOS has now published proposals for its future funding having considered stakeholders’ feedback and the principles FOS has established in its previous conversations. It is proposing to rebalance the levy and case fee to aim for a 50:50 split, with a significantly greater proportion of their income from the FOS levy as opposed to case […]

Aug 19 – Only the headline

Freelance journalist Simon Read brought me sharply to attention when he wrote recently about whether anyone reads newspapers anymore.  The march of on-line and the ability to get anything on Twittersphere, Messenger or Whatsapp has totally changed “communication”.  As Trump continually condemns fake news, the challenge we all face is deciding who is gaslighting who. […]