FCA Business Plan 2025/26: what regulated firms need to know
The FCA's Business Plan for 2025/26, published in April 2025, reflects a regulator operating under the dual mandate introduced by the Financial Services and Markets Act 2023: protecting consumers and markets while actively supporting UK competitiveness and growth. The plan is shaped by four strategic priorities — reducing and preventing serious harm, setting and testing higher standards, promoting competition and positive change, and enabling informed consumer choice. Firms should read the Business Plan not merely as a statement of the regulator's internal ambitions but as a forward indicator of supervisory contact, thematic reviews, and enforcement appetite.
On consumer protection, the FCA has signalled that Consumer Duty enforcement will intensify in 2025/26. The regulator expects to see demonstrable evidence of firms' annual board reviews, outcome monitoring programmes, and remediation of identified harms. The plan flags particular concern about the retirement income market, where drawdown strategies, charges, and the adequacy of guidance and advice have been identified as sources of potential consumer detriment. Wealth managers and platform operators should expect targeted engagement around their drawdown offerings and associated client communications.
Market integrity and financial crime remain cross-cutting themes. The Business Plan references the ongoing work on PISCES (a new category of intermittent trading venue), continuing implementation of the Wholesale Markets Review, and the FCA's Digital Securities Sandbox. On financial crime, the plan indicates continued supervisory focus on high-risk sectors including wealth management, payments, and crypto, with emphasis on firms' use of transaction monitoring data as a fraud and money laundering detection tool. The FCA also intends to expand use of its own data capabilities to identify outlier behaviours across the population of authorised firms.
The competitiveness and growth objective features prominently. The FCA has committed to streamlining the authorisation process — including a target to process 98% of straightforward applications within six months — and to consulting on further deregulatory measures. Firms engaged in innovation should be aware of the expanded Regulatory Sandbox and the FCA's intention to issue a further Call for Input on AI in financial services during 2025. The plan also confirms that the FCA will consult on simplifying the Appointed Representatives regime, following the enhanced oversight rules introduced in 2022.
Sector-specific signals
Insurance firms should note the FCA's intention to review Consumer Duty implementation in GI and pure protection products, with specific reference to add-on products and multi-occupation buildings insurance. Investment managers should monitor the FCA's planned review of the effectiveness of the UK MiFID transaction reporting regime. Payments firms face continued scrutiny of their AML controls and fraud prevention measures, with the PSR's mandatory reimbursement framework for APP fraud now in force from October 2024.