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Simon Morris

Partner

Picture of Morris Simon

Simon Morris

Partner

T +44 20 7367 2702
F +44 20 7367 2000
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.

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"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.
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Education

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

Feed

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4 December 2017
Risk Mat­ters: In­sur­ance Sec­tor Up­date (Winter 2017/18)
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Publication Insurance
22 Feb 19
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...
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Law-Now Funds
23 October 2017
The new Seni­or Man­agers and Cer­ti­fic­a­tion Re­gime
Ex­tend­ing it across the Fin­an­cial Ser­vices in­dustry
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Guide Financial Services & Regulation
21 Dec 17
Tem­por­ary ‘Brexit per­mis­sions’ crown round of reg­u­lat­ory up­dates to...
On 20 Decem­ber 2017, an­nounce­ments from the PRA, the FCA, the Bank of Eng­land and the Treas­ury re­vealed a frame­work for ap­proach­ing cross-bor­der busi­ness in a post-Brexit world, with a par­tic­u­lar fo­cus...
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Law-Now Brexit
17/02/2016
Life, pen­sions & longev­ity risk
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Brochure
17 May 17
Up­dated re­mu­ner­a­tion guid­ance from the PRA and FCA
Over the last month, both the Pruden­tial Reg­u­la­tion Au­thor­ity and Fin­an­cial Con­duct Au­thor­ity have pro­duced fi­nal ver­sions of up­dated guid­ance on re­mu­ner­a­tion. This fol­lows the form of the FCA’s draft...
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Law-Now Employment & Pensions
16/06/2014
Life, pen­sions & longev­ity risk
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Brochure Life Assurance
18 Nov 16
FCA pub­lishes In­ter­im Re­port on As­set Man­age­ment Mar­ket Study
The FCA has found price com­pet­i­tion to be weak in a num­ber of areas of the as­set man­age­ment in­dustry, identi­fy­ing con­cerns as to wheth­er the mar­ket is provid­ing value to cus­tom­ers (both for re­tail and...
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Law-Now Banking & Finance
04 Oct 16
Bo­nus buy-outs and oth­er bank­ing re­mu­ner­a­tion up­dates
The Pruden­tial Reg­u­la­tion Au­thor­ity (PRA) has re­cently is­sued two pa­pers – one re­leas­ing the PRA’s long-awaited fi­nal rules on buy-outs of vari­able re­mu­ner­a­tion and the oth­er pro­pos­ing to up­date its...
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Law-Now Employment & Pensions
11 Aug 16
CRDIV re­mu­ner­a­tion re­view by the European Com­mis­sion
The CRDIV re­mu­ner­a­tion pack­age, which came in­to ef­fect in 2014, has an built-in re­quire­ment for the European Com­mis­sion to re­view its ef­fect­ive­ness in 2016. The Com­mis­sion has re­cently is­sued sev­er­al...
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Law-Now Employment & Pensions