It will recruit 80 employees to enact this initiative and protect consumers from potential fraud, poor treatment and to create a healthier market, as well as improving its own accountability.
The FCA will prioritise its core aims of preventing serious harm to customers, setting higher standards, and promoting competition. It will also hold itself accountable against published outcomes and performance metrics for the first time.
The regulator, which oversees the conduct of around 51,000 firms nationally and prudentially supervises 49,000, has calculated that for every pound it spends on its operations, consumers and small businesses benefit by at least £11.
This plan builds on its initiative last year, where the body said it would commit to becoming more innovative, assertive and adaptive.
So far, this has resulted in it reforming the general insurance market and banning the practice of price-walking. It also brought its first ever criminal prosecution under anti-money laundering regulations with a £264m fine issued against Natwest.
Nikhil Rathi, chief executive of the FCA, said: “Our new strategy enables the FCA to respond more quickly to the rapidly changing financial services sector.
“It will give us a foundation to continuously improve for the benefit of our stakeholders, and respond swiftly to economic and geopolitical developments.”
