The new UK gov abolishes the FSA (Financial Services Authority)

This is big news in the UK, where the FSA is the equivalent of the SEC in every respect: responsibilities, but also failure to achieve its duties, and general uselessness as it interferes with the investors duties to perform their own due diligence.

Unfortunately, this seems to be more a political move than anything else: let's just put the failure on Gordon Brown's back (he created the FSA) by abolishing this agency, but keep the responsibilities and duties and transfer them to the Bank of England.

June 16 (Bloomberg) -- Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne said he will abolish the Financial Services Authority and give most of its power to the Bank of England, in the most sweeping changes to Britain’s financial regulatory system in more than a decade.

The financial watchdog will be wound down and replaced by three bodies over the next two years, the chancellor said. A Prudential Regulatory Authority will be created as a subsidiary of the central bank. Osborne will also set up a Financial Policy Committee at the bank and establish a consumer protection and markets agency.