Commercial mortgage-backed securities—where the assets underlying the transaction are commercial mortgages.

Capacity Market Code

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published a portfolio letter to the claims management sector, setting out its updated view of harms and risks that claims management companies (CMCs) pose, and priority areas for FCA supervision of CMCs. The FCA is encouraged by improving standards but warns of areas where firms are failing to meet regulatory requirements.  The FCA’s supervisory focus for the next two years is on CMCs embedding the Consumer Duty, the service standards provided by CMCs, issues around personal injury, and lead generation. In particular, the FCA warns CMCs to ensure consumers understand the FCA’s temporary changes to handling rules for motor finance complaints, before they enter into a service contract.

The European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee (ECON) has adopted a package of legislative updates to the EU’s bank crisis management and deposit insurance (CMDI) framework concerning orderly market exit for banks of all sizes. Changes to the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD), the Single Resolution Mechanism Regulation (SRMR) and the Deposit Guarantee Schemes Directive (DGSD) aim to better safeguard taxpayers’ money, bring more banks into scope, empower authorities to handle effectively a potential failure, and harmonise depositor protection.

The Continuous Mortality Investigation (CMI) has published a consultation on its plans for the next update to the CMI Mortality Projections Model, expected to be released in April 2024. If approved, this update, CMI_2023, would produce cohort life expectancies at age 65 in a similar way to those in the previous update, with one week lower for males and one week higher for females. The CMI Model is used by UK pension schemes to make assumptions about future mortality rates. The consultation will close on 11 March 2024.

The House of Commons Culture Media and Sport (CMS) Committee has published the government’s response to its second report on connected technologies titled ‘Connected tech: AI and creative technology’, which was released on 30 August 2023. The report highlighted concerns from across the creative industries about allowing the developers of artificial intelligence (AI) to mine private intellectual property (IP) for profit without sharing with the original creators. The government’s response confirms that it is no longer proceeding with its original proposal for a broad copyright exception for text and data mining. The government adds that a more detailed response to the CMS Committee’s recommendations will come with the government’s response to the AI Regulation white paper and the publication of the Cultural Education Plan, which is due in the first half of 2024.

The Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) Committee of the House of Commons has published the government response to its reccomendations set out in its report on the risks to sport and culture of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and the blockchain. The CMS Committee report highlighted concerns over widespread copyright infringement in relation to art, and concerns over financial harm and reputation damage to clubs in relation to professional sports and the promotion of cryptoassets. In its response, the government rejected the CMS Committee’s call for a new code of conduct to protect creators, consumers and sellers from infringing and fraudulent material on NFT marketplaces and has instead pledged to ‘monitor developments’.

The Council of the EU has announced its adoption of the Regulation amending Regulations (EU) No 648/2012 (EU EMIR), the Capital Requirements Regulation (EU) 575/2013 (EU CCR) and the Money Market Funds Regulation (EU) 2017/1131 (EU MMF Regulation) as regards measures to mitigate excessive exposures to third-country central counterparties (CCPs) and improve the efficiency of EU clearing markets (EMIR 3) and the Directive amending Directives 2009/65/EC, 2013/36/EU and (EU) 2019/2034 as regards the treatment of concentration risk arising from exposures towards CCPs  and of counterparty risk in centrally cleared derivative transactions. The EMIR 3 and the amending Directive will be published in the EU’s Official Journal (OJ) before entering into force 20 days later.

The European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee (ECON) has adopted its position on the amending Directive which revises the rules set out in the recast Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II), the Insurance Distribution Directive (IDD), the Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (UCITS) Directive, the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFMD), and the Taking-up and Pursuit of the Business of Insurance and Reinsurance Directive (Solvency II). In a separate vote Parliament adopted its position on an amending Regulation revising the Packaged Retail and Insurance-based Investment Products (PRIIPs) Regulation. The amendments form those in the Commission’s Retail Investment Package, which itself forms part of the 2020 Capital Markets Union Action Plan.

The European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee (ECON) has published a report on the amending Directive which revises the rules set out in the recast Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II), the Insurance Distribution Directive (IDD), the Undertakings for Collective Investment in Transferable Securities (UCITS) Directive, the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFMD), and the Taking-up and Pursuit of the Business of Insurance and Reinsurance Directive (Solvency II).

Civil Nuclear Constabulary: Formerly known as ‘UKAEA’ Constabulary, the CNC was established on 1 April 2005, as directed by the Energy Act 2004. The CNC reports to an independent Civil Nuclear authority'>Police Authority (CNPA); it operates under the strategic direction of the BEIS. It is the armed police force which is responsible for the protection of civil nuclear material.

The National Commission for Data Protection and Liberties (CNIL) has issued an administrative fine of €32m on Amazon France Logistique for breaching articles 5, 6, 12, 13 and 32 of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, Regulation (EU) 2016/679 (EU GDPR) regarding warehouse stock and order management, work schedule and employee appraisal, as well as video surveillance processing. This follows an investigation against Amazon France Logistique after press articles about practices of the company in its warehouses as well as several complaints received from its employees.