The FSA should expect more challenges to its investigatory findings during 2004, through the Financial Services and Markets Tribunal, warned law firm Reynolds Porter Chamberlain (RPC).
In its annual Financial Services Update, RPS said 2003 saw the first case where the tribunal disagreed fundamentally with the findings of an FSA investigation. The tribunal found that the FSA was wrong to have withdrawn the approved status of stockbroker Geoffrey Hoodless.
RPC partner Jonathan Davies said: "Firms have in the past been unwilling to take on the FSA but we feel that the decision in the Hoodless & Blackwell case will now encourage more resistance."
RPC said market improvements during 2003 were unlikely to reduce claims against financial advisers due to the "increasingly onerous standards imposed by the regulators and the widening scope of regulation".
