FCA chief, Nikhil Rathi, warned of ‘adverse consequences’ if challenge made to settlement, court filings allege

The boss of the UK’s financial regulator is accused of threatening a consumer group with “adverse consequences” if it blocked a £9.1bn compensation scheme meant to settle the motor finance scandal.

Legal documents reviewed by the Guardian said the alleged comments by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) chief executive, Nikhil Rathi, amounted to “an inappropriate intervention by a public official”.

City firms tapped for case studies to try to convince global watchdog that London has cleaned up its act

The government is asking bankers and lawyers to provide feelgood stories about how they blocked dirty money from entering the UK, as ministers try to prove the UK’s money-laundering controls are working.

The Treasury’s call for evidence is meant to illustrate that the UK has upped its game when it comes to preventing financial crime, particularly since its last dismal assessment by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) global crime watchdog in 2018, which fuelled allegations that London had become a hub for “dirty money”.