Britain’s financial regulator has said it will “fundamentally reshape” its plan to “name and shame” more of the companies it investigates after the proposals provoked a big backlash in the City of London. Nikhil Rathi, chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority, said it would present revised proposals “in the next week or so” before making a final decision early next year.
Nathan Willmott, a partner at law firm Ashurst, said many in the City suspected that the regulator’s new approach was designed “to convey to the media and to politicians that it is an active and aggressive regulator” by pushing companies to agree to an early settlement of its investigations. But he added: “It seems that the FCA is now heavily underplaying what it believed the effect of the proposals would be.