Meeting MiFID II rules with help from expert team

The challenge

A large advisory network and portfolio manager was struggling to get to grips with the requirements of MiFID II and their obligations. With both its business lines affected by the new regulation, our client needed to understand how MiFID II overlapped with other regulatory changes like IDD, making it a particularly complex review.

Our client was also struggling to prioritise workload and get the necessary change programmes off the ground quick enough to meet the implementation deadline.

Our approach

Our team had just the right mix of in-depth regulatory knowledge and experience of managing regulatory change programmes. We developed a bespoke solution for our client, including:

1. An in-depth review of our client’s business model and propositions
2. Detailed ‘side-by-side’ analysis of the new and current rules in order to identify which rules represented a material change to the current regulatory framework.
3. Identify the impact on our client – an Article 3 firm.
4. Identify gaps in the current operating model and compliance framework
5. Analysis of other forthcoming regulatory changes in order to ensure these were also accommodated by any actions taken

Having identified the gaps and key actions needed, we put together an action plan that our client’s internal team could easily roll out. While keeping implementation in-house meant cost savings for our client, we made sure that standards didn’t suffer by providing assurance and oversight. We double checked that changes to processes and procedures were all appropriate and that the project stayed on track, as well as providing training sessions for key stakeholders. This meant our client was ‘MiFID II ready’ well before the deadline, safe in the knowledge that all procedures, systems and controls were up-to-date.

Outcomes

• Our expertise and experience of managing regulatory change programmes meant our client was fully compliant with FCA requirements well before the implementation deadline.
• We took the hassle out of MiFID II compliance by unwinding complex information and taking care of the planning.
• Our intelligent allocation of resources and flexible approach utilised our client’s existing team, keeping costs under control but standards high.

Evidence

The client successfully met all regulatory obligations ahead of the implementation deadline, with all internal procedures, systems, and controls independently verified as fully compliant with the FCA rules.