No duty of care owed by the banks in relation to the FCA Review into IRHPs

The Court of Appeal (McFarlane, Lewison and Beatson LJJ) has handed down judgment in three linked appeals – CGL Group v RBS, Bartels v Barclays and WW Property v NatWest – holding that banks do not owe a duty of care to customers in relation to the Review they conducted into interest rate hedging products pursuant to the agreement with the Financial Conduct Authority.

This important and much-anticipated decision clarifies the position following conflicting first instance decisions.  As such, the Court of Appeal has refused to recognise what is commonly referred to as a “Suremime claim” following the decision of HHJ Havelock-Allan QC in Suremime v Barclays [2015] EWHC 2277 (QB).

All of the banks involved in the appeals – RBS, Barclays and NatWest – were represented by members of Fountain Court: Andrew Mitchell QC, Patrick Goodall QC, Tamara Oppenheimer, Adam Sher and Ian Bergson.

A copy of the judgment is available here.