May looked like a deregulation story. The King's Speech, a Financial Services and Markets Bill, a growth allowance for ring-fenced banks. But for any firm that markets a financial product, the month pointed the other way.
The FCA opened a review of the claims management market under Consumer Duty, targeting aggressive marketing, misleading ads, and unfair exit fees. Alongside it, the Consumer Credit Act's prescriptive disclosure rules are being recast into outcomes-based FCA rules, so credit promotions will be judged on whether customers actually understand them, not on whether a required line was present.
Ireland held the same pattern. The Consumer Protection Code 2025 is now live and adding written-reasons and fair-value obligations of its own.
The takeaway for marketing and compliance teams is that the structural rules are loosening while the bar on what you say in your financial promotions keeps rising. You also need to be able to show what you checked, against which rule, and when.
Our May UK and Ireland Regulatory Horizon Scanning brief covers every development across banking, consumer credit, crypto, investments, insurance, payments, and the Irish market, with what each one means for your firm.
Read the full brief by clicking here.
Once you're booked in, we'll send you a free playbook on Financial promotions compliance for FinTechs.
