Financial Services Regulation and Compliance - General Cross Sectoral Jan 2020

Domestic

Central Bank of Ireland announces its supervisory and enforcement priorities for 2020

Derville Rowland, Director General of Financial Conduct at the Central Bank (CBI), outlined the CBI's priorities for the regulation of financial conduct in an address to the Association of Compliance Officers of Ireland on 15 January 2020.

A focus of the address was consumer protection, with key topics including a substantial review of the Consumer Protection Code which will be launched by the CBI, differential pricing in the motor and home insurance sectors, and the protection of borrowers in mortgage arrears including long term sustainability and the appropriateness of alternative payment arrangements for consumers with a particular focus on Credit Servicing Firms. In terms of funds supervision, the CBI's focus will include the implementation of CP86 on effectiveness and delegate oversight, liquidity management in UCITs, securities lending and liquidity risk and resilience in property funds.

Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing continue to be key supervisory priorities, with Ms Rowland stating that the CBI would develop a strategy for greater supervision of Virtual Asset Service Providers.

Finally, in terms of its enforcement priorities, the CBI continues to focus on the proposed Individual Accountability Framework, including the proposed Senior Executive Accountability Regime. The CBI also continues to focus on Fitness and Probity, with particular mention given to the importance of accuracy and honesty in the completion of applications relating to pre-approved controlled functions.

European

EBA updates its guidelines on fraud reporting under PSD2

The EBA has published an amendment to its 2018 guidelines on fraud reporting under the revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2). The changes reflect some amendments that resulted from clarifications provided by the European Commission on the application of strong customer authentication to certain type of transactions. The amendment introduces two new data fields for reporting transactions where SCA is not applied for reasons other than an exemption to SCA.

For more information on this topic please contact any member of A&L Goodbody's Financial Regulation team.

Date published: 7 February 2020