FSA successor to protect 'irrational' investors

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Investors cannot be counted on to make rational choices so regulators need to "step into their footprints" and limit or ban the sale of potentially harmful products, the head of the UK's new consumer protection watchdog said.

In an interview with the Financial Times, Martin Wheatley, who will head up the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), said the 2008 financial crisis had fundamentally reshaped regulators' assumptions about consumers. "You have to assume that you don't have rational consumers. Faced with complex decisions or too much information, they default ...

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