Regulation

“We have seen a monumental shift in the way consumers act in recent years” explained Emilie O’Neill of Perennial Better Future

Once a stalking horse for a small cabal of noisy backbenchers, “Home First, Super Second” has found its way into the Coalition’s policy arsenal ahead of an unpredictable election.

The Liberal Party joined the ALP in focusing on housing affordability during their formal campaign launch this week.

Aging populations are putting strain on pension and health care systems and the Covid-19 pandemic, by causing people to delay births and pushing up the number of dependents, hasn’t helped.

All fund managers like to talk about protecting capital, but at Ruffer Investment Management, it is a more embedded philosophy than most. The firm was founded by Jonathan Ruffer on the principle that “investors like making money, but they hate losing money more.” Ruffer is built to preserve capital for the long-term:  centred on “absolute-return investing with…

The US central bank announced a quarter percentage point increase in its benchmark rate overnight, which was widely expected. For the first time in three years has it increased rates and it expected to keep this going until they reach between 1.75 percent and  2 percent by the years end. Sonal Desai, CIO of Global…

From being a ‘crypto critic’, Australia has quickly transformed itself to soon be a ‘crypto leader’ by proposing a framework for managing cryptocurrencies and crypto companies, in the biggest shakeup in the country’s payment systems in 25 years. Covid-19 showed us how quickly society digitised its payments systems with the onset of Afterpay and its…

Deakin University, the largest provider of postgraduate qualifications to the financial planning sector this week announced a partnership with the SMSF Association. Along with Kaplan Professional, Deakin will allow students in their Master of Financial Planning degrees to complete SMSF Association accredited requirements. The course will include a unit that meets the educational requirement to…

The Musical Chairs report released by Adviser Ratings offers insightful data on the wealth management industry after undergoing significant changes over the last five years. As advisers return to the office, with the occasional small COVID-19 outbreak, movement between firms continues. The first quarter saw 2.2 per cent of advisers move to a new licensee,…

The Australian Securities and Investment Commission, regulator of the financial adviser industry, this week released their long-awaited guidance regarding Ongoing Fee Arrangement changes set to come into force on 1 July 2021. In a positive move for advisers struggling under reams of compliance paperwork, the guidance replaced Regulatory Guide 245 and offers a straightforward commentary…

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) has flagged an increase in both the Transfer Balance (TBC) and Total Superannuation Balance (TSB) caps, which impact everything from the eligibility to make contributions, tax exemption of earnings and even the co-contribution. Following the release of the consumer price index (CPI) figures earlier this week, the TBC and TSB…

The good news for IOOF (ASX: IFL) following the battering it took from shareholders last month is that the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has approved its MLC takeover. The bad news is that the remaining class action against it has been funded. The ACCC said on Monday it would not oppose IOOF’s $1.4…