UPDATE 1-FCA to announce increase in 2014-15 budget - Sky News

(Adds details on funding)

LONDON, March 30 (Reuters) - The Financial Conduct Authoritywill set out plans on Monday for an increase in its annualfunding requirement for 2014-15, Sky News reported late Sunday.

The multi-media news service said the financial regulator isexpected to budget its annual funding to just under 450 millionpounds ($748.69 million), about 3 percent above the 432.1million pounds it said it required last year.

The FCA's 2014-15 budget does not take into account the costof regulating thousands of consumer credit providers, which willtransfer to the auspices of the regulator for the first timethis week, Sky said.

The news service reported without citing sources that thefees will be frozen for thousands of the smallest firmsregulated by the FCA, with the minimum charge remaining at 1,000pounds.

Earlier in the day, the Sunday Times reported that MartinWheatley, chief executive of the FCA, is facing calls for hisresignation after a gaffe that wiped billions of pounds from thevalue of insurance companies.

The newspaper said the Association of British Insurers (ABI)is expected to write to finance minister George Osborne tocomplain about the FCA, which has been accused of creating afalse market in insurers' shares.

The FCA was due to announce a review into the life insuranceindustry in its annual business plan on Monday. But a senior FCAsupervisor outlined plans for the review in a press interview onFriday, which resulted in sharp falls in share prices across thesector, including Resolution, Aviva, Legal &General, Standard Life and Prudential.

The FCA later in the day said the review wouldn't look atsales practices nor would it apply current standards to oldpolicies, such as on the level of premature exit charges, afterwhich the insurers' share prices recovered some of their losses.

The Sunday Times said senior sources at four of Britain'sbiggest insurers had told it that Wheatley's position was untenable following Friday's events.

Both the FCA and the ABI declined to comment.

On Saturday Andrew Tyrie, the head of the UK Parliament'sTreasury Committee, described the issue as an "extraordinaryblunder". ($1 = 0.6011 British Pounds) (Reporting by James Davey in London and Aashika Jain inBangalore; Editing by Greg Mahlich, Bernard Orr)