The Financial Conduct Authority has appointed Therese Chambers and Steve Smart as joint executive directors of enforcement and market oversight.
The appointments come five months after the regulator announced that current director, Mark Steward would step down and leave the FCA after seven years.
Chambers will leave her current position as director of consumer investments to take up the post while Smart will join from the National Crime Agency where he has served as director of intelligence.
The appointments signal an expansion of the FCA’s enforcement and market oversight division as it carries out its three year strategy to reduce the growth of financial crime.
The appointments mean the FCA’s executive committee will have nine members, made up of five women and four men, including three from minority ethnic backgrounds.
In a statement the FCA said recent market events have “underlined the importance of effective market oversight to support financial stability”.
Chambers will take on the role as executive director on April 1 while Smart will join on June 21.
Mark Steward will leave the FCA on April 13.
Sarah Pritchard, who is currently executive director of markets in the supervision, policy and competition division will take over executive responsibility for the FCA’s international work after Steward’s departure. This will be in addition to her existing role.
Commenting on the appointments, FCA chief executive Nikhil Rathi thanked Steward for his years of service and said: “Enforcement is a key regulatory tool allowing us to hold firms and individuals to account for wrongdoing and helping to reduce and prevent serious harm to consumers and in markets.
“Therese and Steve will be a powerful combination, bringing a complementary skillset, which will enable us to do just that.”
Adding to this, Chambers, who has worked at the FCA for over 20 years said she looks forward to the new role as the FCA “increasingly [uses its] powers to protect consumers and tackle harm.”
Single legal function
Separately, the FCA has announced the creation of a single legal function, bringing together the general counsel division and the legal group, which currently sits within enforcement and market Oversight.
The FCA has said this will ensure a joined up legal capability across the organisation.
jane.matthews@ft.com
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