FCA Finalises Transaction Reporting Reform for 2028

The Financial Conduct Authority has finalised changes to the UK’s transaction reporting regime, with the new rules scheduled to take effect on 3 April 2028.

The regulator said transaction reports remain central to market-abuse detection, market monitoring and supervision, but that the regime can be made more proportionate. The final package reduces the number of transaction reporting fields from 65 to 52 and removes foreign exchange derivatives from reporting requirements.

The FCA also said the reform removes reporting obligations for millions of financial instruments that are only traded on EU trading venues. Firms will also have a shorter window for correcting historical reporting errors, with the correction period reduced from five years to three years.

The regulator said the long lead time is intended to give firms enough time to prepare, test and implement updated reporting systems.

Why it matters

Transaction reporting is mostly invisible to retail traders, but it affects the compliance architecture behind brokers, execution venues and market makers. Cleaner reporting requirements can lower operational burden, while still preserving the data regulators need to monitor suspicious trading and market quality.

For brokers, fewer reporting fields and narrower scope may reduce back-office complexity. For traders, the key issue is whether platforms keep strong controls while reducing avoidable compliance cost.

What to watch next

Watch for implementation updates before April 2028, especially from UK brokers and venues that handle equities, derivatives or cross-border order flow. Traders should also monitor whether reporting changes lead to clearer broker disclosures around execution, trade reconstruction and regulatory data quality.