Alvarez & Marsal announced that it is strengthening its UK Regulatory Advisory Services practice with the appointment of Jeremy Heales as a senior director. Heales joins from the Financial Conduct Authority where he held a number of roles, most recently head of Retail Banks.

This is the latest in a series of senior hires for A&M’s regulatory team in London, following the recent appointments of Paul Sharma, former Deputy Head of the Prudential Regulation Authority, and Graeme Ashley-Fenn, ex-Director at the Financial Services Authority. Mr Heales will add powerful expertise and frontline experience in what is a fast changing and challenging regulatory environment.

Peter Briggs, global head of Financial Industry Advisory Services, Alvarez & Marsal, said: “The challenge facing financial institutions today is to remain both compliant with an increasingly complex and interventionist regulatory environment while adjusting business models to achieve attractive rates of profitability and returns on capital. Jeremy brings 28 years of experience working in financial services regulation, and played a pivotal role in setting up the FCA, along with designing and implementing the new conduct supervision model. Combined with the experience of our other senior team members, A&M now offers an unrivalled regulatory advisory service in the UK and a growing presence globally.”

Heales’ 28 years in regulation spans the Bank of England, the FSA, where he was head of Regulatory & Supervisory Change, and the FCA, where he led the introduction of the new three-pillar conduct supervision model, which included the development of a new prudential approach for those firms not regulated by the PRA. As head of Retail Banks, Heales was responsible for assessing firms against this new supervision model, which included chairing risk committees, leading reviews of supervised institutions and addressing issues on complaints handling, payment protection insurance, financial crime, as well as enforcement cases.