UK: FCA review - corporate governance disclosures by listed issuers

The Financial Conduct Authority has recently published a short report explaining the results of a review of a sample of annual reports - for accounting periods ending in 2016, 2017 and 2018 - in respect of corporate governance disclosures: see here (pdf). The FCA has identified several areas where, in its opinion, governance disclosures need improving; it has asked, for example, companies to consider whether their statements of compliance with the UK Corporate Governance Code permit shareholders to evaluate how the Code's Principles have been applied. The FCA also expressed its concern that in "certain cases" the disclosures provided were boilerplate in nature and did not change significantly from year to year.