Compliance

This week the nation’s financial advisers received news that their annual registration fees, or “adviser levies.” would increase by the equivalent of 160% over the next two years. According to the regulator’s announcement, the total cost per retail advice licence is now $1,500 plus an additional $2,426 per authorised representative under the licence. This means…

The Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA) was established in 1 November 2018, combining the Financial Ombudsman Service, Credit and Investments Ombudsman (CIO) and Superannuation Complains Tribunal (SCT) into a more efficient and well resourced group. Covering most aspects of the financial services industry, the data was naturally tilted towards complaints against the banking sector and…

It may be a lull between storms but the SMSF Association has no major political battle to contend with at the moment, instead focusing on smaller issues to do with regulatory change and embarking on new research about small funds’ performance in case that becomes an issue in future. John Maroney, the association’s chief executive,…

It was a busy day for the Federal Government, announcing the proposal to disband FASEA, introduce lack of independence disclosure requirements and then finally, introduce a new fee disclosure regime. Advisers had been hit with an increasingly complicated set of rules when it came to receiving fee payments from ongoing clients. A combination of grandfathering,…

Governance is the pillar of environmental, social and governance (ESG) principles that investors have been actively considering for the longest period of time. This is not surprising, as in some ways, it could be said that governance is probably the most important aspect of ESG. An organisation’s board’s role is to appoint the CEO and…

Though no longer a new theme, non-bank lending requires a refresher. Everyone is by now aware of the limitations of bank finance and therefore the provision of alternative capital. The reality of this shift in credit to the private sector is that investors will wear the losses that banks used to do, but with a…

It’s hardly a fair comparison, is it? To put REA Group alongside Domain Holdings?

Let’s face it: most people find wealth management mysterious, tedious and something best done some other day.

All that glitters, active vs. passive and why a closer look at infrastructure.

Former Commonwealth Bank executive Adam Bennett has been appointed as Suncorp’s chief information officer. He was previously at Commonwealth Bank for over 15 years and was most recently group executive business and private banking, executive general manager of local business banking and chief information officer for the bank’s retail and business banking divisions. He will…

Global asset manager State Street Corporation released a survey of institutional and sovereign wealth investment professionals last week. The report offered insights into a survey of 640 executives spanning defined benefit funds (33%), corporate pension plans (25%) insurance (32%) and sovereign wealth funds. The report was commissioned through data collection group CoreData and provided some…

BNK Banking Corporation’s chief executive Simon Lyons has stepped down after over four years in the role. Lyons was chief executive of Goldfields Money prior to its renaming at BNK. The company’s deputy chair Don Koch has been appointed as interim chief executive while a search for a permanent replacement is undertaken. Koch has over…