Home / People / Simon Morris

Simon Morris

Partner

Picture of Morris Simon

Simon Morris

Partner

CMS Cameron McKenna Nabarro Olswang LLP
Cannon Place
78 Cannon Street
London
EC4N 6AF
United Kingdom
Languages English, Spanish

Simon Morris is a partner in the firm’s Financial Services and Products team. He joined CMS London in 1980, qualified as a solicitor in 1982 and has been a partner since 1988.

He specialises in advising financial institutions on commercial and regulatory matters. He has also represented firms in over 400 regulatory and enforcement proceedings brought by the UK PRA and FCA, their predecessors and overseas regulators.

Simon is a member of the City of London Law Society Financial Services Sub-Committee and author of Financial Services Regulation in Practice (Oxford UP 2016). He was appointed a Commissioner of the Jersey Financial Services Commission in January 2015 and was named as the Best Regulatory Lawyer of 2008 at Complinet’s Fourth Annual Compliance Awards in January 2008.

more less

"Simon Morris is a ‘market-leading authority on financial services issues’, and ‘the gold standard’ for contentious work in the industry."

Legal 500

"Standout partner Simon Morris has strength in both contentious and non-contentious work. Clients say: "He is obviously a heavyweight partner. I take great confidence and comfort from his knowledge. He comes across the regulator quite often and seems very in touch with it all." "

Chambers

"Simon Morris is a ‘market-leading authority on financial services issues’, and ‘the gold standard’ for contentious work in the industry."

Legal 500

"Standout partner Simon Morris has strength in both contentious and non-contentious work. Clients say: "He is obviously a heavyweight partner. I take great confidence and comfort from his knowledge. He comes across the regulator quite often and seems very in touch with it all." "

Chambers

Relevant experience

Regulatory change

  • A number of banks, including a global systemically important bank, on implementing the new UK regime for individual responsibility at banks.
  • Asset managers and other firms on the introduction of CRD4 requirements.
  • The MiFID project for one of the UK’s largest banks.

Dealing with the regulators

  • Authorisation for banks, insurers, asset managers and other firms; successfully handling the largest fully contested application for authorisation.
  • Applications for individual approval; successfully obtaining approval for senior managers initially refused approval.
  • Applications for change in control (including a major contested application), variations of permission and passporting.
  • Preparing firms and individuals for routine and focused supervisory visits, including client asset, conflict, financial crime, treating customers fairly and governance reviews.

Corporate governance

  • A board effectiveness review for a broker dealer to fulfil an FCA requirement.
  • The FSA’s two enforcement cases involving weak governance.
  • Conflicts reviews for asset managers, insurers and banks.

Meeting regulatory requirements

  • Perimeter issues for banks, insurers, asset managers and other firms, enabling them to operate in the UK within clearly established boundaries.
  • On meeting the FCA’s requirements on protecting against money laundering, bribery and corruption and market abuse.
  • Firms to meet regulators’ evolving requirements on the shared liability of manufacturers and distributors for financial products; handling the FCA’s first enforcement case on this topic.
  • Liability to meet regulatory, Ombudsman and Compensation Scheme fee levies.

Handling retail redress and complaints

  • Insurers and other firms on structuring complaints and claims handling functions.
  • On major redress projects, advising whether compensation is due , how much and when.
  • Helping firms to resolve complaints before the Financial Ombudsman Service, including major lead complaints and successfully halting or overturning FOS decisions through legal process.

Managing enforcement

  • Firms in over 400 enforcement proceedings including.
  • Reporting adverse events and handling subsequent investigations.
  • Firms on helping to manage the appointment of a skilled person.
  • Firms and individuals in formal disciplinary proceedings.
more less

Education

  • BA Law, Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge
  • PhD History, Birkbeck College London
more less

Expertise

Feed

Show only
09 February 2021
FS Break­fast Sem­in­ar: Brexit, Cov­id, Con­naught & Lon­don Cap­it­al - the fu­ture...
In this we­bin­ar, our team will take stock of the cur­rent hur­ricane of reg­u­lat­ory change in­clud­ing: the post-Brexit op­por­tun­it­ies the Gov­ern­ment is seiz­ing to stream­line UK reg­u­la­tion;the PRA’s and...
Event Webinar
16 October 2020
We­bin­ar: Fo­cus­ing on fair­ness - Cul­ture and gov­ernance to de­liv­er fair...
The FCA wants firms to foster healthy cul­tures where con­duct and fair out­comes are at the fore­front of their busi­nesses.  In this we­bin­ar we will look how cul­ture and gov­ernance can sup­port pos­it­ive...
Event Webinar
02 July 2020
FCA Ex­ten­sion of the Seni­or Man­agers & Cer­ti­fic­a­tion Re­gime (SM&CR) im­ple­ment­a­tion...
The dead­line for solo-reg­u­lated firms to have un­der­taken the first as­sess­ment of the fit­ness and pro­pri­ety of their Cer­ti­fied Per­sons has been ex­ten­ded from 9 Decem­ber 2020 to 31 March 2021. To en­sure...
Law-Now Banking & Finance
01 July 2020
FS We­bin­ar: Fo­cus­sing on Fair­ness - FCA pri­or­it­ies for the year ahead
‘Fair­ness’ is set to be­come the reg­u­lat­ory buzzword for 2020 as the pan­dem­ic con­tin­ues to shed a new light on firms’ busi­ness mod­els. In this, the first of a series of Fin­an­cial Ser­vices We­binars...
Event Webinar
21 April 2020
In­sur­ance 2020: Cul­ture
Cul­ture, once the pre­serve of man­age­ment gurus, is swiftly mov­ing main­stream.   Over the past few years both the PRA and the FCA, as well as the European reg­u­lat­ors, have in­creas­ingly drawn at­ten­tion...
Law-Now Insurance
22 October 2019
FS Break­fast Sem­in­ar: Cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments (Lon­don)
In this sem­in­ar, Si­mon Mor­ris will of­fer an up­date on cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments, look­ing in par­tic­u­lar at:Cur­rent trends in fin­an­cial crime su­per­vi­sion;Vul­ner­ab­il­ity, pri­cing and the new reg­u­lat­ory...
Event Legal
29 March 2019
FS Break­fast Sem­in­ar: Cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments (Ed­in­burgh)
In this sem­in­ar, Si­mon Mor­ris will of­fer an up­date on cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments, look­ing in par­tic­u­lar at:A new fo­cus on op­er­a­tion­al riskThe FCA’s com­pet­i­tion powers in prac­ticeStew­ard­ship as...
Event Legal
27 March 2019
FS Break­fast Sem­in­ar: Cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments (Lon­don)
In this sem­in­ar, Si­mon Mor­ris will of­fer an up­date on cur­rent reg­u­lat­ory de­vel­op­ments, look­ing in par­tic­u­lar at:A new fo­cus on op­er­a­tion­al riskThe FCA’s com­pet­i­tion powers in prac­ticeStew­ard­ship as...
Event Legal
21 March 2019
Struc­tured Fin­ance and Cap­it­al Mar­kets we­bin­ar series
CMS will be run­ning a Struc­tured Fin­ance and Cap­it­al Mar­kets we­bin­ar series, start­ing this Au­tumn. Each month you will have the op­por­tun­ity to listen in on a dif­fer­ent hot top­ic, presen­ted by ex­perts...
Event Webinar
08 March 2019
We­bin­ar - SMCR: how to op­tim­ise your pro­ject for real gains (as well as...
The ex­ten­sion of the Seni­or Man­ager & Cer­ti­fic­a­tion Re­gime to all solo-reg­u­lated firms means that im­pacted firms should set up their pro­jects to meet the im­ple­ment­a­tion dead­line and have time to deal...
Event Webinar
22 February 2019
Shar­ing in­form­a­tion about com­pany valu­ations: the FCA is­sues its first...
On 21 Feb­ru­ary 2019, the Fin­an­cial Con­duct Au­thor­ity (FCA) is­sued its first form­al de­cision us­ing its com­pet­i­tion en­force­ment powers since the FCA be­came a con­cur­rent com­pet­i­tion reg­u­lat­or in 2015, a...
Law-Now Funds
28 February 2018
Break­fast sem­in­ar: Seni­or Man­ager & Cer­ti­fic­a­tion re­gime (Ed­in­burgh)
The ex­ten­sion of the new Seni­or Man­ager & Cer­ti­fic­a­tion re­gime bey­ond banks, and in­surer seni­or man­agers, to all FCA and PRA reg­u­lated firms raises a series com­plex chal­lenges. This sem­in­ar sets out to...
Event Legal
Load more articles