If you are appointed to provide financial services on behalf of an Australian financial service licensee, you must enter into an authorised representative (AR) agreement. In this blog we set out some tips and traps to be aware of when negotiating this agreement. Authorisations Of course you should only enter into an AR agreement with... Read more continue reading
23
Jul
2021
LexisNexis® Risk Solutions has released its 2021 True Cost of Fraud™ APAC Study covering the retail, ecommerce, financial services and lending sectors for Australia, Hong Kong, India and Japan. The study provides a snapshot of fraud trends in the Asia Pacific (APAC) region during the pandemic and spotlights key pain points for firms in relation... Read more continue reading
09
Jul
2021
Financial services utility, APIR Systems, has launched new functionality to provide clients with the ability to store Target Market Determinations (TMDs), ahead of the impending Design and Distribution Obligations (DDO) legislation. The DDO legislation, which is being overseen by the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), is scheduled to come into effect from 5 October... Read more continue reading
06
Jul
2021
Courtesy of the latest round of Royal Commission legislation[1], from 1 July 2021 financial advice firms need to update their Financial Services Guides (FSGs), Ongoing Service Agreements and Financial Disclosure Statements (FDSs). The key changes are: FSGs must include written disclosure that you are not “independent, impartial or unbiased” (assuming you are not independent within the meaning of... Read more continue reading
04
Jun
2021
AMP acknowledges the civil proceedings brought by ASIC in the Federal Court in relation to alleged breaches concerning the deduction of life insurance premiums and advice service fees from the superannuation accounts of deceased customers. In 2018, AMP identified issues with its processes regarding deceased customer accounts and self-reported to the regulator. The matter was... Read more continue reading
28
May
2021
An ASIC review of a targeted selection of retail managed funds found that they did not face serious investor liquidity challenges during the height of COVID-19 market disruption, and that their liquidity frameworks were generally adequate. While there was a significant drop in net investor cashflow in the first half of 2020, responsible entities of... Read more continue reading
03
May
2021
Husband (H) and wife (W) are members of a self-managed superannuation fund, and as part of their estate planning, they want to direct the trustee of the fund to set up child pensions for their eligible children if either of H or W die early. As their children are likely to qualify for the child... Read more continue reading
03
May
2021
“On behalf of the ASIC Commission and team I’d like to congratulate Joe Longo on his appointment as the next ASIC Chair and Sarah Court as an additional Deputy Chair”, siad ASIC Chair James Shipton. Joe is known to many at the agency from his time as National Director of Enforcement from 1996-2000 and subsequent... Read more continue reading
03
May
2021
ASIC has announced that it will extend one of three temporary relief measures designed to help the financial advice industry provide consumers with affordable and timely advice during the COVID-19 pandemic. The original relief measures were announced on 14 April 2020 and are set out in ASIC Corporations (COVID-19—Advice-related Relief) Instrument 2020/355 (refer: 20-085MR). Instrument 2020/355 expires... Read more continue reading
16
Apr
2021
ASIC has called on insurance claims handling firms to lodge licence applications (new and varied) as soon as possible, and by no later than 7 May 2021. Since 1 January 2021, claims handling and settling is a financial service which requires a licence by 1 January 2022. Deputy Chair, Karen Chester said ‘Time is running... Read more continue reading
09
Apr
2021
Earn CPD Points
CPD: Behaving badly – could our decision-making flaws undermine the consumer protection intent of recent superannuation changes?It is widely accepted that consumer financial protection is important [...]
CPD: Client centric segmentation - a best practice framework for advisersExtensive research[1] into the underlying pillars of success for financial [...]
CPD: Ethics and the professional practiceIn financial planning, ethics can be distilled into acting in [...]
CPD: The S-Curve and the emerging consumerDisruption and disintermediation are increasingly common themes across the global [...]
CPD: When disclosure harms, rather than protects, consumers - an adviser guide to DDO complianceWhilst the Hayne Royal Commission undoubtedly put a wrecking ball [...]
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