Investors are not concerned about the occasional mistake at the Financial Conduct Authority but about the potential for "misfeasance in public office".
Founder of the Transparency Task Force Andy Agathangelou told FT Adviser at a rally outside FCA headquarters in London yesterday (26 September) investors were concerned the FCA could be acting "with a sense of misbehaviour".
At yesterday's annual public meeting it was revealed that the FCA had received a legal letter alleging "misfeasance" which it was currently looking into. A previous similar one had been dismissed as without merit.
"This really concerns us, particularly when it relates to whistleblowers or victims of investment scandals," said Agathangelou.
"That's the kind of thing that we really want people to start to understand is a part of the problem set that the FCA is experiencing."
He said the TTF was staging the event to get the regulator's attention.
It was one of several events held by TTF to date designed to get the FCA around the table to listen to investors' concerns but so far they have fallen on deaf ears.
"If the leadership team of the Financial Conduct Authority is so unwilling to talk directly to its critics, to those of us who are campaigning to change things, then it does suggest that there's an unwillingness to actually face the difficult challenges that it's got.
"Until that happens Carmen, we don't see the FCA fixing itself. We see the need for some kind of external intervention, perhaps through Parliament."
He added: "There's far too much human suffering being caused as a direct consequence of various kinds of regulatory failure.
"And you know what, in some ways, the best reported of all of these failures is the LC&F scandal, London Capital and Finance.
"Dame Gloucester's report was extremely critical of the way that the FCA handled that matter.
"And you don't need to listen to people like me to understand what's going wrong at the FCA. People can just google the Gloucester report about London Capital and Finance and read it all for themselves."
The FCA censored LCF for its “unfair and misleading” promotions of minibonds in 2023, after it had collapsed in 2019 owing more than £230mn to some 14,000 bondholders.
A report by Dame Elizabeth Gloster published in December 2020 found the FCA had shown "significant gaps and weaknesses" in its policies and practices ahead of LCF's collapse.
The investigation also found the regulator could have done more to protect investors in LCF and its handling of information from third parties regarding the business was "wholly deficient".
Among the people protesting was Barrie Smith, who said his family had lost £350,000 investing in LCF and Blackmore bonds, after compensation from the FSCS.
He had been drawn in after looking for a suitable investment for his spare capital on a comparison site, on which LCF and Blackmore came out top.
