Adviser compliance with the Best Interest Duties of the Future of Financial Advice (FoFA) reforms will be one of the key areas of focus for the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) in the next six months.
The corporate regulator has released its enforcement record for the first half of the year during which it announced its particular areas of focus would be FoFA related obligations, including Best Interest Duties, and that much of this work would take place under its long running Wealth Management Project.
The project, which commenced in October 2014, focuses on the conduct of the largest financial advice firms and has seen ASIC engaged in 24 actions against major banks, and where 17 of those actions related to bans of a permanent or time limited nature.
In the report ASIC stated it had undertaken two actions with ANZ and Westpac Bank, three actions with AMP, five actions with Macquarie Bank and six actions with Commonwealth Bank and National Australia Bank.
Of the actions not related to bannings, two were for enforceable undertakings, four related to fines and one related to a person charged with criminal proceedings.
The numbers would appear to be low compared to the wider enforcement work of ASIC over past six-month period (1 January to 30 June 2016) during which the regulator laid 96 criminal charges; charged ten persons in criminal proceedings; removed 24 individuals from financial services; issued 75 infringement notices; and completed 93 investigations.
