Draft Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Ring-fenced Bodies, Core Activities, Excluded Activities and Prohibitions) (Amendment) Order 2024 Draft Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Designated Activities) (Supervision and Enforcement) Regulations 2024 Draft Short Selling Regulations 2024

Tulip Siddiq Excerpts

Tuesday 7th January 2025 General Committees

[The Economic Secretary to the Treasury (Tulip Siddiq)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the draft Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Ring-fenced Bodies, Core Activities, Excluded Activities and Prohibitions) (Amendment) Order 2024.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to take the draft Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Designated Activities) (Supervision and Enforcement) Regulations 2024 and the draft Short Selling Regulations 2024.

[Tulip Siddiq]

It is a pleasure to serve under you, Mr Vickers, during this quiet week in politics. The regulations that we are introducing today will ensure effective, proportionate regulation for the financial services sector, first, by reforming the ringfencing regime to be more flexible while upholding financial stability safeguards; secondly, by creating a new framework for the regulation of short selling; and thirdly, by enabling better supervision and enforcement of designated activities under the Financial Services and Markets Act 2023.

I will turn first to the reforms to the ringfencing regime for banks. As the Committee will know, ringfencing was introduced following the global financial crisis on the recommendation of the Independent Commission on Banking, and it came into full force in 2019. It requires large, complex banks to separate the services that they provide to households and small and medium enterprises from investment banking activity.

In 2022, an independent statutory review of the regime recommended updates to ensure that it operates as intended and is proportionate. This statutory instrument improves the regime and implements changes from the review. The reforms that it contains will improve competition in the banking sector, reduce costs and support economic growth. They have been developed with the Prudential Regulation Authority, which is content that they also maintain appropriate financial stability protections.

I will outline the most material updates to the regime. The reforms will ensure that in future only the largest, most complex banks are subject to the regime, with two key changes. The first is an increase in the primary deposit threshold—the amount of core deposits a bank can hold before it is required to ringfence—from £25 billion to £35 billion. This accounts for growth in the deposit base and other relevant economic indicators since ringfencing was introduced and it supports competition. The second change is the introduction of a new secondary threshold, which exempts retail-focused banking groups from the regime, where investment banking activity accounts for less than 10% of common equity tier 1 capital.

This SI also makes changes to the way that banks within the regime can operate. It introduces measures to encourage more investment by ringfenced banks in UK small and medium enterprises and to reduce the compliance burden associated with the regime. It also creates significant new flexibilities to allow ringfenced banks to operate globally, subject to PRA rules, as well as to provide a wider range of goods and services to their customers.

I turn to the draft Short Selling Regulations. Short selling is the practice of selling a security that is borrowed or not owned by the seller with the intention of buying it back later at a lower price to make a profit. Short selling plays a healthy role in the proper functioning of financial markets. It provides essential liquidity to markets, which drives investment in British companies; it helps to drive economic growth; and it helps to ensure that investors pay the right price when investing in shares.

The draft regulations introduce a more streamlined UK short selling regime, which focuses on equities, rather than both equities and sovereign debt. The new regime also introduces a reformed public disclosure regime for short selling, ensuring that there is transparency over short selling activity, without the issues identified with the current regime through the 2022 call for evidence.

However, as I am sure the Opposition spokesperson will identify, there can be risks associated with short selling. As such, it is important for the Financial Conduct Authority to have the tools to effectively monitor short selling activity and intervene if necessary. This statutory instrument provides the FCA with broad rule-making powers in relation to short selling. This will allow the FCA to effectively oversee short selling in UK markets. It will also mean that the UK’s short selling rules can be adapted and updated by the FCA in a more agile way in future—for example, to better adapt to new global standards or to take account of market innovation and new business models. The instrument retains the FCA’s powers to intervene in relation to short selling activity in UK markets in exceptional circumstances, which is an important feature of the current regime.

Turning to the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Designated Activities) (Supervision and Enforcement) Regulations 2024, to give the FCA the broad rule-making powers for short selling that I just mentioned, the new short selling regime operates under the designated activities regime—known as DAR. The DAR was introduced into the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 by the Financial Services and Markets Act 2023, which the Opposition spokesperson will know very well, since we sat across from each other, debating it for days. It allows the Treasury to designate certain activities to be regulated by the FCA. However, persons carrying on those activities under the DAR do not need to become full authorised persons like banks or insurers. This enables proportionate regulation for activities where it would be disproportionate to have met all requirements for authorisation.

The Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Designated Activities) (Supervision and Enforcement) Regulations 2024 enable the FCA to supervise and enforce the rules it makes under the DAR. They do this by enabling the FCA to exercise existing supervision and enforcement powers under FSMA 2000 on persons carrying out designated activities, whether or not they are authorised. In the first instance, these powers will be extended to the activities covered by the Consumer Composite Investments (Designated Activities) Regulations 2024 and the Short Selling Regulations 2024. Tha will enable effective supervision of these regimes.

I thank the Committee for putting up with these quite technical amendments. The statutory instruments ensure that our financial services industry is subject to a rulebook that is fit for purpose, more proportionate and tailored to UK markets. I hope the Committee will join me in supporting these regulations.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tulip Siddiq]

I thank the Opposition spokesperson for his questions. I am grateful that he is supporting us. He agrees that the SIs represent an important step in ensuring that our approach for the regulation of financial services is effective and proportionate. We feel that these are sensible, technical reforms. The Treasury undertook detailed work with the PRA after the independent review, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned, released its final report in 2022, consulting on a draft package of measures in 2023 and refined those proposals in line with feedback.

It is recognised that the ringfencing regime was originally designed so that the threshold would need to be adjusted over time to reflect the evolution of banking practices and growth in the deposit base. The Treasury considered several metrics as well as financial stability and competition considerations in proposing the £10 billion increase. Increasing the deposit threshold will provide smaller banks with more headroom to grow before being subject to the requirements and costs of ringfencing. We feel that will support domestic competition in retail banking markets. A competitive and dynamic market will improve outcomes for depositors. The reform may encourage inward investment in the UK as new entrants to the UK banking market will have more room to develop economies of scale before being subject to the regime.

While the independent review, which the hon. Gentleman mentioned, did not suggest that uprating was necessary to maintain the policy aims of the current ringfence, the Government have recognised that the threshold acts as a barrier to the growth of smaller players in the market, dampening competition for retail customers. His points are valid, and we will be looking at them, but there are no plans at this point to change the threshold in the way he mentioned.

On the hon. Gentleman’s points about name-and-shame proposals, I am very pleased to hear that he has been reading my interviews in detail. I have raised those proposals several times with the FCA and welcome the fact that it has listened to industry feedback on them. It has taken some steps to address some of the concerns raised by industry, which he will know about. I have been clear with the FCA that effective, proportionate regulation is key to our aims, and that it needs to deliver the Government’s mission to drive inclusive growth.

As the hon. Gentleman knows, the FCA is operationally independent but accountable to Government and Parliament. I am engaging closely with the FCA on name-and-shame proposals and will make sure that any potential impacts on international competitiveness and growth are properly considered. That is not to dismiss the concerns about those proposals from industry, which I have heard first hand. The subject comes up repeatedly in my meetings with the FCA. I hope that reassures the hon. Gentleman a little bit.

I think I have covered most of the hon. Gentleman’s questions, but am happy to write to him on any others. Generally, we feel that this SI is important overall to our mission of growing the economy. I know that when the hon. Gentleman was in government, he had sight of a similar SI and was in agreement with it. I thank the Committee for agreeing to pass this legislation.

Question put and agreed to.

DRAFT FINANCIAL SERVICES AND MARKETS ACT 2000 (DESIGNATED ACTIVITIES) (SUPERVISION AND ENFORCEMENT) REGULATIONS 2024

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 (Designated Activities) (Supervision and Enforcement) Regulations 2024.—(Tulip Siddiq.)

DRAFT SHORT SELLING REGULATIONS 2024

Resolved,

That the Committee has considered the draft Short Selling Regulations 2024.—(Tulip Siddiq.)