What's Changing? - Regulation

Please see below selected recent intelligence about regulation. This is a synthesis of major recent developments at business schools, thinktanks, media, commentators, and other key influencers.

2018

April

• According to GZEROMedia, the EU’s rigorous privacy laws limit companies’ ability to send Europeans’ data across borders. Back in the US, meanwhile, if you’re not a citizen, authorities can ask you not only for your passport, but for your social media passwords as well. This trend of regulatory fragmentation will accelerate as world leaders start to grapple more seriously with the ethical and economic challenges of artificial intelligence and other advanced technologies. We are a long way from the 1990s vision of the internet as a public good that promised a post-national future. Where, exactly, we are going isn’t fully clear yet. But national governments will have a lot to say about it, asks GZEROMedia.

2016-17

• Deloitte announced the release of its new regulatory and investor reporting tool, helping banks, asset managers and insurance firms cope with high levels of regulation and complex tax guidelines. Prisma looks to cut down the compliance burden for its clients by using one set of data to create multiple reports for regulatory and investor requirements. The service comes almost a year before the introduction of regulation on packaged retail and insurance-based investment products (PRIIPs), a regulatory breakthrough that will also assist asset managers.

• Companies around the world will be forced to add close to $3tn of leasing commitments to their balance sheets under new rules from US and international regulators - significantly increasing the debt that must be reported by airlines and retailers. A new financial reporting standard — the culmination of decades of debate over “off-balance sheet” financing - will affect more than one in two public companies globally.

• PwC published its latest Regulatory Briefing document, prepared this each quarter as a guide to developments around the world, based on input from many experts in the network. The new version of the Briefing, which is now available in a more interactive form on the global website with clients, regulators and other external stakeholders.

2015

• The EU Audit Regulation Directive (ARD) represents a great opportunity to raise the status of audit and restore confidence in the discipline - providing the profession "gets it right". That was one of the messages to emerge from the Financial Reporting Council's recent panel discussion on 'Enhancing justifiable confidence in audit through implementation of the EU Audit Regulation and Directive' about its ramifications for the industry and wider business community. Panellist Hywel Ball, EY's UK head of audit, said that while the opportunity for positive change was clearly there, the profession was "on a tipping point" thanks to a "perfect storm" of innovation, big data, concerns over corporate cyber attacks such as that which affected Talk Talk, and the fact that "corporate reporting is becoming less relevant".

• Deloitte announced the launch of its financial services focused Asia Pacific Centre for Regulatory Strategy. Deloitte said the centre will, “promote regular dialogue with the industry and regulators, and deliver critical insights on managing the aggregate impact of regional and international regulatory policy”. Lead partner, Kevin Nixon said, "For Deloitte it will significantly strengthen the firm’s capability to provide clients in the Asia Pacific with the necessary forward looking advice on successfully managing complex regulatory change". The centre’s regional team also includes Tony Wood (FSI Risk & Regulatory Leader, Deloitte China and Hong Kong), Tsuyoshi Oyama (Centre for Risk Management Strategy Leader, Deloitte Japan) and Tse Gan Thio (Cyber Risk Services Leader, Deloitte Southeast Asia). To mark the launch, Deloitte also released a supporting thought leadership piece - ‘Regulatory reform: The Asia Pacific state of play’.

• Deloitte's Top 10 for 2015: Our outlook for financial markets regulation discussed whether 2015 will be the turning point in the post-crisis re-regulatory agenda, when the focus shifts from repairing balance sheets and reputations to the role of financial services in promoting jobs and growth.

• CEOs are urging governments across the world to tackle the burden of regulation and renew their focus on achieving fiscal balance, according to PwC’s 18th Annual CEO Survey. It found that over regulation remained the top of perceived threat to business. Scott McIntyre, PwC’s co-leader of government  and public services, said: "Affordable government has become more important than ever, particularly in light of recurrent budget cuts to reduce fiscal deficits in many countries."