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PS25-3 Redress scheme policy paper : Page 7 1.23 : “.... We recognise the right of firms to exclude agreements only involving high commission and ending before 26 March 2020 where they can evidence that commission being payable was clearly and prominently disclosed, even if the amount was not disclosed.” - Oh dear, was that date method assumption just proven legally flawed ? Few years of high commission claims just flushed ?

The "even if the amount was not disclosed" - this has special meaning later on... lol.... should read paras 205-212 "Absurdity" and paras 213-217 "General Absurdity". 214 is a special one, if you swap out "thousands" for "millions" in the FCA threat of claims going (or not anymore) to the FOS.

This is just this one of a few rulings before the FCA see (or not) the inside of a court. Yeah, a bit board... best bits later.

Even more sleepy popcorn....munch...munch...

2026 EWHC 1555 https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/barclays-and-others-v-financial-ombudsman-service-limited/

As per what I said in a prior post, it's not the headline ruling that may count rather what is said that matters more, I'd be interested in hearing from anyone else who has read the full ruling. It seems pretty damaging for the reputation of the FOS to have the FCA arguing against them in court and for the judge to say "243. In each claim, the error of law is so fundamental that the appropriate discretionary remedy is to quash the decision."

I think I could hear a few doors closing on some CMC's in the background.

Sleepy popcorn...munch...munch....

It's just the start, as I have mentioned previously I'm waiting until August before saying more, don't want to spoil it...

"because their controversial commissions were not disclosed" ....lol..... lol..... thud.... [falls out of chair laughing again]

Back to the baking hot popcorn....munch...munch...

Case listing for the 19th does not have it showing and nor does the 22nd.

https://www.court-tribunal-hearings.service.gov.uk/insolvency-and-companies-court-chd-daily-cause-list?artefactId=f3f18281-cc0f-4732-9e2d-a44563d9c9bc

May have been an eariler days application hearing, which may have listed some more detail or not or given the reference numbering it has not reached the court yet.

CR-2026-004772 - Foxy Mamma (Victoria) Ltd and another : might be a more interesting case.

Have a good popcorn weekend...munch...munch...

Later case referenced have the second party that is being wound up.

This looks like the initial first party notification who is doing the winding up on a loan that has been defaulted on.

At this point the village has been notified and all the escapees will be posting shortly.

Yawn... back to the anoying popcorn... munch...munch...

See what happens with the Angel case ruling. My position is sitting back and watching because in the interim there are other factors that will playout and distort the price with the side event possibility of a takeover that results in a rather large burning short move. The final results will have to instigate a change to investors because otherwise it just increases the probability of a takeover a lot further, which I'm not opposed to.

August I believe things will start to change and will be more clear on that in August because I'm a shareholder and not a claims company :-) My own personal belief is that 800p end of next year is reasonable target, hence I'm very happy to sit back and watch. The other benefit with CBG is that due to the vey low book value the capital position is likely to weather any financial storm far better than the rest of the market (look back at the relative performance from CBG caused by the short swaps that seemed to result in CBG out performing the market in market wide pullbacks). CBG perversely seems to have an inherent downside hedge provided by the shorts, which seems quite ironic.

The 4% odd short overhang is (finger in the air) between 100-200p of the current share price discount. During a significant squeeze that could end up with a large short term overshoot, although the capped response after the supreme court ruling is a guide on an expected event move vs an unexpected unprepared squeeze.

The 450p swaps or whatever insturment seems to be creating the 450p level may have some time to liquidate or expire. Reading tea leaves from some lines on a chart as a proxy for delta hedging that 450p atraction may dissapear by end of July. Yesterdays upswing partly broke one trend, although that was seemingly with a few small/medium sized sells (about £0.5m) trying to push down. The short Ahl Partners Llp reduced by 0.1% around the 14th maybe at the 445p level, so is the 450 a swap exit level for the 1% swap that was picked up by another large holder which was reported. Who knows ? I'm just reading tea leaves when I use tea bags.

Depends on that itchy desire to "spok, do something" moment vs sitting back and patiently waiting. That's just my belief and too much sun based hallucinations of shareholder self supporting rose tinted glasses bias..... or not. Each to their own, do your own research, figure it out past rolling a dice or just go the the bookies instead.

Oh, and never forget the popcorn....munch...munch...

"as they have been qualified" - that's the main issue, because an is it a DCA tick box is not qualified in terms of defining an unfair relationship claim when none of the other facts are considered. The zero or BoE and below interest rate levels make the DCA "unfair" issue may be separate to the quantum involved, however the unfair test is fact based on all relevant matters and you can't have an unfair relationship when a customer gets a better than BoE financing rate, whatever the process or name is given to the way in which the deal is derived. What's unfair about a better than what the lender could get interest rate ?

Summary of all that is that I'm happy to sit back and watch what happens from now on because I believe we have passed the peak fear / redress moment and the mountain of percieved claims is going to start to be reduced from here on in, either chip by chip or the occasional land slip or large scale avalanche. The reduction will not necessarily mean that the remaining claims suddenly become more expensive to end up larger than the provisions (in the case of CBG). The remaining valid claims may well just end up the regular volume.

TMS vs Vanquis will also have implications on the way in which the whole claims process proceeds because some claims companies may fold before being liquidated. The hearing indicated the initial claim started off with over 6,000 cases and was reduced to around 5,200 due to invalid claims being included and then also mentioned that there were still a number of invalid claims within the list.

What will the FCA do in response to a scheme collapse ? I don't think they will try for a second redress scheme because if the limitation act applies then there may only be 1 or two years of DCA claims potential to act on (2019-2021 ban) and the economic justification for that would be very, very difficult to balance with the FCA's new objectives (growth). That point may require the FCA to have a sweeeping brush moment.

Who knows. Do your own research. Do your own thing.

I'm just guessing and could even be an AI... beep.. beep... that likes popcorn...munch...munch...

There are 4 parts (am / pm two days), over 9 hours.... From the arguments put forward the principle was that the fact sensitive nature of an unfair relationship, as defined within section 140, can't be quantified into simplistic tick boxes. The group action, however was angled more from the perspective of case management rather than defining what is or is not an unfair relationship, however the grouping is under law and not an arbitrary definition without detail.

From the perspective of the consumer side they were after grouping claims (without initially detailing who is within the group action - "warehousing" comments and complaint) and then getting the lenders to provide them with a typical cohort sample to take to court, without having to provide that sample from the consumer side. The judges commented that is the wrong sequence and the lenders did not have a legal obligation to provide the details in that way, hence the case has been going on for four years (longer than your timeline because of the other prior cases and overall sequyence of events) and in the words of the judge gone nowhere.

The limitations act issue was interesting by it's near complete avoidance within the hearing, although it was about the principle of group action and not the duration or specifics as to bounding cases on time. My feel was that this was an issue to be dealt with elsewhere and wonderd if council had been instructed to avoid it because of the clear implications onto scheme 1, which seem even more doomed.

The judges primary interest seemed to be avoiging the courts from being "flooded" with claims, however the lenders pointed out that there are already thousands of (motor) cases per week being handled this way and it would not prevent the court from grouping claims anyway.

The consumer side seemed to be mainly fishing to try and get the commercially confidential lender-broker agreements and then cherry pick cases based on the details of those agreements, however the lenders council read out the supreme court statement around the dealers having no duty to the customer and their own commercial interests.

Going on that, and guessing, the high court ruling will be overturned, but the principle of group action unchanged and the claims go back to the normal court process because the implication is that it otherwise changes the nature of how group action is carried out in a way that puts the cart before the horse. That's my sleep deprived perspective.

The ruling details may well define and clarify the nature around the fact sensitive nature of an unfair relationship and it may be done in a way that runs in line with the existing law, but counter to the FCA's ambitions of a socialist utopia with free money trees to be planted in every farm, powered by solar panels.

The ruling itself will not necessarily be of relevance, it is what and how the judges frame the ruling that may well matter much, much more.

Back to the popcorn....munch...munch..

Sometimes I really hate the internet.... ended up watching the full Angel v Black Horse case hearing.

(1) Patrick Giltinane and others v Startline Motor Finance Ltd

(2) Sharif & Others v MotoNovo Finance Limited

(3) Hallsor & Others v Aldermore Bank PLC

(4) Thomas And Others v Volkswagen Financial Services (UK) Limited

(5) Bateson & Others v BMW Financial Services (GB) Limited

(6) Angel And Others v Black Horse Limited

(7) Barlow & Others v Vauxhall Finance Plc and another

(8) Green and Others v Close Brothers Limited

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1hVIGs9DqSE

The ruling, if it is not inclusive of imaginary components, may well have very significant implications for the redress scheme and may or may not sink the redress scheme early due to what it means for section 140. Curiously the limitations issue seemed like the proverbial elephant in the room.

Meanwhile with the Trump trade will likely dominate Monday.

What each person decides at any point is up to them.

Zzzzzzzz..... popcorn...munch...munch...

Here's a critical question - if DCA's were so unfair according to the FCA, why did they need to consult on a rule change ? Oh, you have broken our (imaginary fiduciary) laws but we need to consult in your neighbourhood to see if they agree that the rule was broken and are happy with what we decide and take years to do ?

How will that look in court ?

Oi, you broke my window, I need a two year research report to investigate the brick, then consult on the issue around brick throwing, then implement a ban on clay being in the proximity of heat.

Popcorn, oh, popcorn... where are thou.... munch...munch...

When looking at the banking sector as a whole and looking for an indexed participant that would be representative, which has no dividend and no share buyback to price into a short hedge position then CBG is quite appealing. That is if you ignore the redress scheme because the court case is not until Novermber time (ish) so in the interim it makes for an ideal sector short hedge. This to me is becoming more apparent with the recent disclocation from the other banks and should ring alarm bells for the management as it increases the attractive position of CBG as a takeover target.

In terms of the legal outlook, the critical failing the FCA made is that within the Hopcraft Supreme Court ruling they interpreted the judges statement of a rule breach as being completely unconditional (hence DCA was included) and ignored the commission size, which triggered the rule breach context. Various judges in different cases have made clear that FCA rule breaches on their own are not something that can make a relationship unfair under section 140.

The probability of 2007 claims being valid is in my mind zero because the current new legislation working it's way through parliament sets a redrewss limit of 10 years and the FCA (and others in court) have argued that government legislation is closer to the historic intent and therefore the FCA trying to push near 20 year claims is a contradiction that I don't see how the future court can ignore. Especially if the case is held after the new rules are in place.

The FOS route is also being clipped back and have to follow FCA rules and where rules have been followed the FOS can't make up arbitraty judgement as they have done in the past. The cost implication is that all these will be cut back on limitation expiry and the lack of a concealed fact makes the DCA argument flawed, especially when the FCA are trying to impose claims after their own rule change occured because they placed a higher determination on a later overturned Court of Appeal ruling.

There are so many issues with what the FCA have done and they are just digging more holes with each statement they make because they are not being consistent and coherent on a historical basis. Truth catches up with deception.

As for AI interpretations, garbage in - garbage out. The garbage in has to be good quality garbage...

That's just my excess of sun talking after thawing out from the prior lack of global warming days, ho hum...

Oh, popcorn indeed.... munch...munch....

I guess in government there is a fine line (not) between incompetence and being deceitful. I guess with no accountability and liability the actions of government have no effect on those creating the actions so nobody is ever held to account for the damage that the government inflicts upon the country.

My reading :

Firstly - our objective is not fighting financial crime (70%) but seeking unfair retroespective illigal redress.

Second - we don't understand the basics of law and no matter what any KC says, we are right and will stompy and cry we are right until slapped down in court.

Thirdly - it was never about motor finance, we wanted to blow the whole financial market up by retrospective claims on every regulated (and non regulated but looks like regulated, maybe) market.

19 million claims irrationality grasp, £6bn of FOS charges threat, £33m so far (mainly external consultancy fees), no mention of implication of TMS vs Vanquis, etc. The massive external costs I would seriously question.

The most truthful and massive implication is very briefly on page 11 : "We remind everyone that the complaints pause expired on 31 May 2026 and, in the absence of a scheme, the default statutory timelines apply." - i.e. the limitations act applies, bye bye 2019.

Other than that it read like a cry for help to the government to change the rules because of those anoying unintended consequences caused by the 2016(ish) crusade of redress the FCA set out on in a very lazily and chaotic manner.

There are quite a few other interesting messages in the letter.

More guesses, assumptions and halucinations. Well worth a read, lol.

Movie style tension moment to get the popcon in....munch....munch....

Liberty2, I fully understand the index position as the Buffet type lookback on long term performance, although I do wonder how the current moment in time is going to pan out because there are indeed an infinite number of paths. I see a golden utopias and dystopian countries as very distinct divergent paths that each country will inadvertantly pass into, some along the lines of Ray Dalio in terms of population and psychological mechanics that create an inevitable path. More like a slow mechanical process rather than a dynamic democratic process of active choice.

The TV series Foundation with the 8th population is an interesting perspective when considering it's 1000x larger population than todays perception of a crowded world. There are a lot of unpopulated areas.

Been watching the CoCo bond for Close as a takeover or recovery proxy and it's moved back above 106, first time since March, so the current 450 index positions and shorts are starting to seemingly move in oposite directions. 455p with 3.7% short yet to be unwound and no idea as to how the shorts think the current FOS and FCA changes currently going through parliament are beneficial for those short positions, let alone the pending court cases. I'm staying quiet on some other details that I think may prove rather interesting and may well be apparent by August.

The FCA's response to the commmittee will be quite interesting and no real surprise that the FCA dont seem to have posted the response, so will have to wait for it to appear on the Treasury committee update....

Back to the popcorn....munch...munch...

Wonder if the Reeves type elabouration of actual role vs "reported" role is catchy in government ?

https://www.fca.org.uk/about/who-we-are/executive-committees

"Nikhil joined the London Stock Exchange (LSE) in 2014, and was appointed CEO in 2015."

Xavier Rolet was CEO between 2009 and November 2017.... wonder if he made notes with Reeves on the back office when the BoE updated thier page https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/about/people/nikhil-rathi/biography

Official CV : https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/2049/documents/19618/default/

Or am I missing something in my imagination ?

Waiting for the FCA response to be posted, oh, popcorn...munch...munch...

The response letter will force the FCA into either disclosing or acknowledging certain facts that may otherwise only get forced during the court cases this year. I wonder if the claims companies are starting to realise what is going to happen.

Geopolitically my perspective is that the US are just continuing the Ukraine energy game that started against the EU and has widened via the inevitability of the Iranian situation reaching peak option call time. Tech is part of this but the generational change is far more about energy first than commodity because all commodities are energy dominated and marginally priced via energy. Global funds will be a very mixed bag because automation is the balance to the breakdown in social cohesion, not the cause.

10 years from now the world may be far more energy constrained because automation will require energy (and cause far more secondary energy demand) and new capacity will be in the low hundreds of GW per year. Solar may end up with 5-10TW per year new capacity in 10 years and battery (sodium) will be the dominant grid scale balancing type by then. The big deflationary wave is yet to start and that will wash away a lot. Economics will face a very different challenge over the next 20 years.

Short term, long popcorn....munch...munch....lol... tick, tock...

Fully agree. Given that FIFA was founded on 21 May 1904 I think there should be claims going back to 1904 because that would be more just, equitable, fair and provide a faster remedy to put cash back into peoples pockets.

I can draft the rules up now quite easily, following the well proven FCA methodology :

[dice rattling] so that's £3 with interest at a statistically proven weighted distribution [dice rattling] of 5% so that would be also be more fair if it was compounded because of the cost of living crisis that was triggered by world war one and the gulf getting a bit upset in the 1970's and cutting the oil off. So by wearing the abacus out, I come to a conclusion that everyone should get £1,154 if they were at a football match in 1904. Relatives will be fully entitled to claim. No proof needed because obviously there will be some documentation issues, so we will just trust the claims are not fraudulant.

Woop, woop. three stooges about. popcorn...munch....munch....

PPI determined that a 50% threashold (no disclosure and no way to determine the commission) as an unfair boundary, however what it said in the opposite was that in the PPI instance, no disclosure was required (at the time) for a commission of less than 50% regardless of the value. At this point note the two arbitraty de minimis values the FCA plucked from the air and then ignored the "cost of living crisis" aka inflation. Those de minimis are far far below what was allowed in PPI as evidenced in a survey, by, non other than the FCA.... in November 2015 !!!

http://www.fca.org.uk/publication/consultation/ppi-research-analytical-report.pdf - Page 40

Bear in mind those payment values are the excess above 50% and the average was well below 100% with over 60% implying over £500 was allowed, non cost of living adjusted pre 2015 values. The FCAs own commissioned report !!!!

The survey also creates other problems for the imaginations and machinations of the FCA circus act.

PPI took around £500bn out of the lending market and dragged growth for the UK as a whole down for a decade, which is no better example of how "regulating for growth" might not actually work when you prioritise (in regulation) consumption over investment to buy votes. The FCA now have a growth agenda which contradicts the prior socilalist mentality and the government expect a change without any broom action, which is another reason to polymarket the chief deckchair arranger being shown how a door works. Iceberg ahead !!

Short roll looks complete from Mon-Wed sells, which, surprisingly (not) had no real buy volume until the last gasp on Wednesday hit that volume. Next weeks update might be quite interesting.

Maybe, maybe not or just my imagination, guesses and beliefs.... meanwhile the No 10 circus act is on stage.

Going to run out of popcorn....munch...munch....

PS26-3 the scheme rules, one of the documents containing the 810 pages of the scheme (which the lenders only had 30 days to digest for an appeal). Two interesting bits for today.

1. Eligibility exceptions : "1.21 .... The commission was £120 or less for agreements beginning before 1 April 2014 and £150 or less after that date. Commission amounts below those levels are unlikely to have influenced the consumer's decision or broker's behaviour." - The fact the flat fee commission (no issue at all) is over £600 does not seem to have any sensitivity and is fine according to the FCA but £151 apparently does and is unfair, also ignoring the huge variation in inflation since 2007, ah, sorry, "cost of living crisis".

2. Excluding a DCA that was already at the minimum interest rate : "The DCA wasn't used to earn additional commission." - However, they only had 3,333 in that data sample in the consultation (DDR2 which had the minimum APR)... Technical annex 1 of the consultation, 1.70 data drop "In the 3333 DCA agreements in the sample data, 1807 values were missing in the ‘minimum APR’ variable" - 1.71 "We have imputed these missing values with zero." - 1.72 "We replaced the zero value with a ‘minimum APR’ observed for a selected lender and assessed the impact. This produced no change in the key headline redress liability figures." - 3.25 "we have estimated the proportion of agreements for which APR > minimum APR is 95.3%." - so, with less than half (46%) of the actual data from a small sample size of 3,333 agreements covering 2007-2024 (87 agreements per year) they conclude that 95.3% had an APR higher than the minimum, when 54% of the sample was missing the minimum APR. Statistical nonsense or fitting the aim by numerical manipulation.

Numerical jiggery pokery...popcorn...munch...munch....

Is there anyone on here with a broker who can quote out of the money calls, 600-700p range upto 12mth ? vol may make them quite expensive, just curious what is being quoted, if anything ?

Looking at last years short positions and wondering if one of the current shorts rolled a 12 month position today... which may make the rest of the week looking a bit volatile (check the short history for May 2025 and make your own mind up).

I believe the FCA are now in a particular hole, in which they face a dilemma that could see some infighting and multiple moves to avoid court because I do not believe the FCA have any upside to the redress scheme seeing the inside of a court room. Listen for the expansion on sounding for a second consultation or other interestingly worded updates because they can't sit back until the court hearing and I believe they will not. The whole process will still end up in court but it may be a case that is already in progress, e.g. TMS Legal vs Vanquis, which actually defines certain facts that pulls the whole circus tent down.

My growing perception is that someone will make a bid for CBG because if they have really good lawyers they should be able to make a rather interesting value proposition. The current shorts are just doing what the market does. Sometimes it's rational and others it is not. That 2.5% short in my finger in the air guestimate is 200p and that's also 200p of a prisoner dilema. I'm in alignment with sg0913 - this is just a time play because from my research all of the downside is now fully provisioned and uncertainty is a lot, lot lower.

Who knows. Do your own research and figure things out.

Surprising popcorn....munch...munch....

Supreme Court 2025 : "320 ... Nevertheless, we agree with the FCA and Court of Appeal (para 20) that the mere fact that there has been no disclosure of the commission, or only partial disclosure, will not necessarily suffice of itself to make the relationship between lender and customer unfair for the purposes of the CCA. It is a factor to be taken into account in the overall balancing exercise required under section 140A."

CP25-27 Annex 1 (page 44) "2.10 Based on our wider work in the motor finance market, we've identified three types of loss (1) consumers pay more than they would in a transparent market, (2) consumer receives an unsuitable product and (3) erosion of trust." - Where in the consultation was an "unsuitable product" defined or questioned ? Question 2,342.42. "Do you agree that you trust the FCA ?"

Supreme Court 2025 "270. Thirdly, at no time in the negotiation of any of these transactions did the dealer give any kind of express undertaking or assurance to the customer that in finding a suitable credit deal for the customer it was putting aside its own commercial interest in the transaction as seller. In the Johnson transaction the dealer did state in writing (in the Suitability Document) that it would seek the most suitable finance package from among its panel of lenders, and a similar statement was made orally to Mr Wrench. But neither of these statements involved the dealer undertaking to exclude consideration of its own continuing commercial interest in the transaction. On the contrary, in three out of the four transactions (ie excluding the Hopcraft transaction) there was disclosure that a commission might be paid by the lender to the dealer, but we do not treat that as typical, or essential to our reasoning. Rather the point is that there was no express undertaking or assurance by the dealer to put its commercial interest aside in seeking a finance package for the customer. Whether there was any implied undertaking is a matter of law, to which we will return."

"286. The outcome might be different in a case where the very nature of the service undertaken can only sensibly be provided by a person who puts their own personal interests aside. Then it would satisfy the necessity test for implication. But it is in our judgment inherent in the arm’s length status of the dealer at all times during the negotiation of the typical transaction that it retains its own interest as seller, ie that it continues throughout to pursue its own commercial interests, free of any undertaking, express or implied, to act selflessly in the finding and negotiation of a finance package. The customer is not bound to accept the finance package offered. It is simply something which the dealer proffers in his own self-interested desire to get the whole transaction past the finishing post. "

I could post this type of stuff all day long.....

"we agree with the FCA".... lol..... Popcorn...munch...munch...