Nikhil Rathi has blamed the Treasury for not acting quickly enough to protect people from mis-sold minibonds.
The new head of the Financial Conduct Authority told the Treasury select committee yesterday that delays, when he worked at the Treasury, had resulted in retail customers losing vast sums of money.
Nearly 12,000 small savers lost £236m after buying high-risk mini-bonds issued by the now collapsed firm London Capital & Finance.
LCF’s promotions had promised returns as high as 8%, and in some cases erroneously referred to its investments as fixed-rate individual savings accounts.
Rathi has vowed to “get tougher” as he starts his new role.
