FCA sues Neil Woodford for allegedly offering unauthorised investment advice

Move comes months after the FCA announced plans to ban the former investment star from holding senior City roles after collapse of popular equity fund

The UK financial regulator is taking legal action against the former investment star Neil Woodford for allegedly offering unauthorised investment advice online, months after being banned from the City.

The Financial Conduct Authority said it was seeking an injunction against Woodford and W4.0, a United Arab Emirates-registered company, to stop them carrying out “potentially unlawful activities”.

“The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has started civil proceedings against Mr Neil Woodford and W4.0,” the regulator said in a short statement on Monday afternoon. “The FCA alleges that Mr Woodford and W4.0 are providing regulated investment advice and making financial promotions through the subscription-based platform, www.w4pz.com, without authorisation.”

It comes a year after the FCA banned Woodford from holding senior manager roles and managing funds for retail investors in the UK as a result of the collapse of his popular equity fund in 2019.

Woodford’s equity fund was worth more than £10bn at its peak, but suffered from several poorly performing investments in companies including the estate agent Purplebricks, the finance company Burford Capital and the doorstep lender Provident Financial. That string of bad bets, combined with Woodford’s decision to put money in a number of private unlisted companies that were harder to sell, led to the fund’s suspension and eventual collapse in 2019.

Woodford resigned in mid-October 2019 and subsequently closed his investment company. Administrators later wound down the fund and returned money to many of its 30,000 investors at a steep loss . Woodford and his investment company were eventually fined a total of £46m by the regulator in 2025.

However, Woodford re-emerged last year to announce he was launching a subscription-based investment service called W4.0 that would allow investors to download and enact his strategies via their own accounts.

Woodford wrote on his blog at the time: “Because we’re not bound by the constraints of fund launches or minimum sizes, I can share more strategies, more ideas, and more updates than would ever be possible in a traditional fund structure.”

“W4.0 is like having Neil Woodford by your side,” the marketing materials said.

According to the City watchdog, the parent company of W4.0, W Four Point Zero FZE LLC, is registered in the United Arab Emirates.

The Guardian was not able to immediately reach Woodford for comment.