Regulation

Another week, another gut punch for the financial advice industry. With the exodus of financial advisers from the industry showing no signs of slowing, the flagging of further increased in the cost of doing business were no doubt an unwelcome surprise.  The fallout from the Royal Commission continues to hit the small and medium business…

The Federal Government’s sympathy for the under-pressure financial advice industry was exhibited once again this week, with Jane Hume, the Minister for Financial Services, delivering an unexpected extension of impending FASEA deadlines. Before the announcement, all registered financial advisers were being forced to sit a comprehensive ethics and general practice exam before 1 January 2022…

As part of the government’s commitment to ensure Australian’s can access quality financial advice, a new disciplinary system for financial planners has been proposed that includes a raft of changes including many previous roles falling under Treasury and ASIC coverage.   The Financial Planning Association of Australia (FPA) has thrown its support for the Government’s…

April may well be remembered as the beginning of the next phase of financial advice in Australia. While the establishment of FASEA may have had far reaching implications, a triumvirate of news this week is set to shape the way advice is delivered and advisers are regulated for decades to come. Leading the headlines was…

Towards the end of last year, ASIC began preparations to request relevant documentation from major dealer groups around life insurance advice. This year is a vital year for the life insurance industry because it’s when ASIC will review the Life Insurance Framework (LIF). The Federal Government had organised to this review back in 2017/18, when…

The financial services regulator ASIC has ramped-up its legislative activity in 2021, following a 2020 dominated by pandemic support and leniency. Commenting to media in recent weeks, ASIC’s deputy chair Karen Chester flagged recent proceedings lodged against industry funds Rest Super and Statewide Super as just the beginning. She flagged a “now-mature pipeline of non-Royal…

The Financial Sector Reform Bill (Hayne Royal Commission Response No. 2) Bill finally passed both houses of Parliament on Friday, as the professional standards expected of the financial advice industry continue to increase. The bill includes three significant changes for the industry, each aimed at protecting clients against the “fees for no service” debacle that…

The recently announced Your Future, Your Super proposed performance test has raised concerns on the potential of unintended consequences in the government’s pursuit of better performing funds. Clearly, the government is squarely focused on the relationship of fees and performance against a standard asset allocation framework. However, many pundits believe the current proposal would see…

The beginning of 2020 has been dominated by headlines of mass adviser departures from the industry, with the number of registered advisers having fallen to levels of five years ago. While this may make for great headlines, it says little about the progress being made in the professionalisation of the financial advice industry, particularly in…

To say the last few years have been testing for advisers would be a gross understatement. The reverberations of the Hayne Royal Commission, which highlighted important issues, though mainly those faced by vertically integrated institutions, has led to a big increase in compliance costs and regulatory hurdles. The result in many cases has been the…

2021 may be shaping up as the ‘Year of the Financial Adviser’. After what has been a tumultuous and stressful few years for the industry, promises of a more streamlined regulatory framework may finally be coming to fruition. Assistant Minster for Superannuation and Financial Services, Jane Hume, and Treasurer Josh Frydenberg had a business day…

Whether it’s due to the long delay on Parliamentary sittings or the realisation that financial advisers had become regulatory gymnasts, it seems the tide is starting to turn on financial advice. The establishment of the Tax Practitioners Board (TPB) and requirements for any financial advisers who provided ‘tax’ advice to be registered was no doubt…