London’s week is a conduct consultation and a Wednesday budget, not a Bank rate decision

London does not have a rate decision in the five-meeting week that CNBC and MUFG are writing about. It has a conduct consultation that is already open, a budget speech on Wednesday, and a sterling price on Monday morning. Those are enough for a gazette entry. They are not a Bank of England policy statement.

The consultation that is actually open#

On 22 October 2026 the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority announced parallel consultations to streamline the Senior Managers and Certification Regime. The Bank of England’s release says comments close on 22 January and that policy is expected in 2027. Some of the changes need legislation. Consulting now, the regulators said, means they can move once Parliament has acted.

Pre-approval would come off a range of roles, including chief actuaries and the chairs of risk and audit committees. Firms would notify those appointments and would still have to judge fitness and propriety. CEOs, CFOs and chairs would still need regulator pre-approval before they start. The certification regime would drop for around 139,000 people below senior-manager level. The stated saving is about £2 billion over ten years. PRA pre-approvals would fall by 43% on the regulators’ figures. For FCA enhanced solo-regulated firms, about 15% of applications would become notifications.

Katharine Braddick, who leads the PRA, said checks stay on the most important roles. Sarah Pritchard, deputy chief executive of the FCA, said the accountability standard can be kept with less process. Both lines are the proposal. The rule is the thing that follows the consultation, not the press notice.

April 2026 was phase one: longer timelines for unexpected senior-manager gaps, less duplicate certification, and a 30% rise in enhanced-firm thresholds. October is phase two, and it is the open document.

Sterling, in front of a speech#

CNBC’s Monday file had sterling up 0.1% at $1.3385. MUFG, looking at the other side of the currency, said euro-sterling had bounced to near 0.8390 after holding below 0.8360 on Friday, a 17-month low, ahead of Wednesday’s autumn budget from Chancellor Healey. One figure is cable. The other is the cross. A London note that prints only $1.3385 has chosen the dollar pair and dropped the budget pair.

MUFG’s five meetings are the Reserve Bank of New Zealand, the Bank of Canada and the Federal Reserve on Wednesday, the ECB on Thursday and the Bank of Japan on Friday. The absence of Threadneedle Street from that list is a fact about this week’s global calendar, not a comment on UK policy. The PRA document that is live is about who must be pre-approved, not about Bank Rate.

File the consultation as open, the budget as upcoming, and sterling as two quotes from two sources. The rate decision that is not scheduled does not need a forecast.

This gazette note is not legal advice and not a prediction of the budget or of sterling.