The FCA has made it a requirement for companies to report the funding labels they’re utilizing on funds which fall underneath Sustainability Disclosure Necessities (SDR) guidelines.
The regulator mentioned it has made the transfer as a part of its new anti-greenwashing rule to scale back deceptive claims.
It consulted on extending its SDR and funding labels regime to portfolio administration with the session closing on 14 June.
The FCA mentioned authorised companies “ought to put together for the brand new anti-greenwashing rule in the event that they make claims concerning the sustainability of their services or products, to make sure claims are truthful, clear and never deceptive”.
It mentioned asset managers should contemplate in the event that they want to label merchandise that purpose to attain constructive sustainability outcomes. If that’s the case, they need to assess whether or not the related merchandise meet the qualifying standards.
It mentioned distributors should put together to make the labels and consumer-facing disclosures obtainable as quickly as moderately practicable to retail traders, and to maintain them updated following modifications made by the agency.
The FCA mentioned: “We’ve got launched a package deal of measures to enhance the belief and transparency of sustainable funding merchandise and cut back greenwashing.”
The regulator mentioned it had launched guidelines and steerage to assist shoppers navigate the marketplace for sustainable funding merchandise.
The principles are:
- An anti-greenwashing rule that applies to all FCA-authorised companies who make sustainability-related claims about monetary services.
- Funding labels, disclosure and naming and advertising guidelines that apply to UK asset managers.
- Focused guidelines that apply to distributors of funding merchandise to retail traders within the UK.
The anti-greenwashing guidelines got here into power on 31 Might. Agency can start to make use of labels with accompanying disclosures from the top of this month.
The naming and advertising guidelines come into power on 2 December whereas there are additional disclosure guidelines coming into impact from 2 December 2025 and a pair of December 2026.
The proposed labelling and Sustainability Disclosure Necessities (SDR) for portfolio managers largely mirror these launched for asset managers in November 2023.
