UK watchdog revamps rules on company research ahead of IPOs

LONDON (Reuters) - Investors in stock market floats in Britain will get access to independent research on companies preparing to list much sooner under final rules published by the Financial Conduct Authority on Thursday.

The finalised rules make no significant changes to draft proposals the watchdog made in March.

"There was broad consensus... that we should proceed with a package of measures aimed at restoring the centrality of the prospectus in the IPO process," the FCA said in a statement.

Under the changes to existing rules, analysts who are not from banks helping a company float, will get access to a company's management team before analysts at the banks advising on the floatation can publish their own research.

The aim of the measures is to make a company's prospectus, a document regulated by the FCA, the main source of investor information on a float.

The rules will come into effect in July 2018.

(Reporting by Huw Jones; Editing by Rachel Armstrong)