As recently recognised by our financial services partner Michael Vrisakis, understanding the Corporations law is much like unpacking Russian dolls. Put simply, complying with the Corporations law is more difficult than it needs to be. But we don’t need to tell you that. In its first (interim) Financial Services Legislation Report published yesterday, the ALRC … Read more

In this article, we look at how ASIC is reacquainting itself with one of the oldest tools in its enforcement toolkit: the court enforceable undertaking (CEU). ASIC’s new Chair Joe Longo has long signalled since commencing with the regulator in June that the “why not litigate?” enforcement mantra of predecessor James Shipton is a thing … Read more

On Friday 6 August 2021, Treasury registered the long-awaited anti-hawking regulations in relation to financial services, which can be found here. The Financial Sector Reform (Hayne Royal Commission Response) (Hawking of Financial Products) Regulations 2021 (Cth) operate to exempt certain conduct from the proposed anti-hawking prohibition coming into effect on 5 October 2021. Some key … Read more

We have previously written about our 12 principles that apply to the implementation of the new anti-hawking regime (NAHR), as well as some observations on the evolving structure of insurance contracts and distribution resulting from the NAHR. In this article, we make some further observations on the scope of an invitation, consent, causation, and the … Read more

The Final Report of the Financial Services Royal Commission called for a follow-up review into the ethics and standards in the financial services sector. In response to this, on 21 April 2021 at the FSC Life Insurance Summit, Financial Services Minister Jane Hume announced that the Government will commission a review of the financial advice … Read more

This edition of our ‘FSR GPS’ (Guidelines, Principles and Strategies) series covers the upcoming changes to the anti-hawking regime for financial products in the Corporations Act, with the new regime coming into effect on 5 October 2021. In this article, we outline: our 12 legal principles which go to the heart of the new anti-hawking … Read more

In this article, we address a cryptic pillar of the current Banking Executive Accountability Regime (BEAR) and the proposed Financial Accountability Regime (FAR): the obligation to deal with APRA and ASIC in an open, constructive and cooperative way. What would this obligation require? What would it not require? How can we prepare for it? In … Read more

This edition of our ‘FSR GPS’ (Guidelines, Principles and Strategies) series covers proposed laws recently tabled before Parliament to impose a statutory condition (Condition) on RSE licensees to have ‘no other duty to act in the interests of another person’ other than a duty that arises in the course of: acting as an RSE licensee; … Read more