FCA Publishes Guidance on Financial Promotions through Social Media

The UK Financial Conduct Authority ("FCA") published guidance for firms using social media to promote financial services and communicate with customers.

The guidance recommended posting material that: (i) is fair, clear and not misleading; (ii) is "stand-alone compliant"; (iii) offers risk warnings and other required statements; (iv) uses images for purpose of advertising; and (v) is compliant with other regulatory issues.

The FCA indicated that product advertisements must be identifiable as such. The FCA reminded firms to have adequate systems in place to sign off on digital media communications. Specifically, the guidance suggested that a firm use hashtags such as "#ad" in order to identify posts as advertisements. The report also recommended the insertion of images into posts to convey risk warnings with a limited number of characters.

See: FCA Guidance.