Financial Conduct Authority boss Nikhil Rathi has shaken-up the watchdog’s C-suite by hiring a team of top female bosses as he looks to push past a series of scandals that happened under his predecessor Andrew Bailey.
Blackrock veteran Stephanie Cohen, Jessica Rusu, Sarah Pritchard, Emily Shepperd and Clare Cole will all take up senior positions in the FCA under Rathi’s helm.
This is one of Rathi’s first big moves in attempting to transform the regulator since taking over for Bailey, who left to become governor of the Bank of England, in October.
In December he unveiled plans to overhaul the regulator after two independent investigations into the FCA’s handling of the London Capital Finance and Connaught scandals revealed a raft of regulatory failings. Since then there have also been calls for an independent investigation into the collapse of the Woodford Equity Income fund, which like the LCF scandal also happened under Bailey’s watch.
In addition to joining up its policy, supervision and competition functions under two new executive directors, Rathi also vowed to transform the FCA into “a more data-enabled regulator”.
Blackrock vet Stephanie Cohen to become COO
Cohen, formerly managing director at Blackrock, will become the FCA’s chief operating officer in June and will take the lead “on operational changes to make the FCA more efficient, dynamic, and technologically driven“.
Rusu will join as the regulator’s first ever chief data, information and intelligence officer. She has previously worked as director of finance and analytics at eBay and will also join in June.
Joining from the National Economic Crime Centre, Pritchard will be appointed executive director of markets, responsible for the FCA’s statutory market integrity objective in the supervision, policy and competition division.
The newly created role of executive director, authorisations, will be taken up by Shepperd. The new role will be responsible for applications to undertake regulated financial services activity from firms and individuals. Shepperd worked as director of customer services and change at Aegon.
The FCA has also appointed Clare Cole as director of market oversight, leading the FCA’s response to Lord Hill’s Listings Review, which will review London’s listings regime with the aim of attracting technology companies to the City.
‘We don’t want to see more of the same’
CWC Research managing director Clive Waller said that the appointment of five women to senior positions at a time when the lack of diversity in financial services is “quite appalling” is either “a quite extraordinary coincidence or a statement of intent.”
City Hive chief executive added it was “encouraging” to see that the regulator has taken on board some of the criticisms by adding extra resources.
“But their challenge is to demonstrate clear and decisive impactful action that is both swift and robust,” she added. “We don’t want to see more of the same.”
See also: FCA admits ‘mistakes’ after scathing reports on mini-bond and collapsed fund scandals
Rathi said of the appointments: “They bring with them a deep understanding of the consumers we seek to protect, the markets we oversee, and all have track records for operational excellence.
“As we continue transforming the FCA – building a data-led regulator – their global experience and leadership, drawn from a variety of backgrounds, will be vital in ensuring we can act more quickly to reduce harm to consumers and ensure market integrity,” he added.
Weighing in on the FCA’s recent efforts Graham Bentley, managing director of gbi2, said: “The FCA’s transformation programme is rather more about being ‘data-led’. This implies significant internal operational re-structuring, and specifically includes restructuring its own financial management; it remains to be seen how much ‘transformation’ translates into better outcomes for customers and the financial advice industry.”
