ASIC today released its sixth six-monthly enforcement report, detailing outcomes achieved between 1 January 2014 and 30 June 2014.

ASIC achieved 256 enforcement outcomes to protect financial consumers and enhance the fairness and efficiency of the financial markets. This included criminal as well as civil and administrative (e.g. a banning or disqualification) actions, and negotiated outcomes, including enforceable undertakings.

There were 89 outcomes achieved in the market integrity, corporate governance and financial services areas, and 167 in the small business area.

Current areas of focus for ASIC include taking action against credit providers for misleading consumers and loan fraud, and working with our overseas counterparts to combat cross-border fraud.

‘The National Credit Act has been in force since 2010. Industry has had sufficient time to familiarise itself with its obligations under the legislation. Where we see loan fraud or misleading conduct ASIC will take enforcement action. The last six months has seen 24 enforcement outcomes in consumer credit,’ ASIC Commissioner Greg Tanzer said.

‘Other future and current areas of focus include the treatment of confidential information by listed companies, manipulation of financial benchmarks and improving auditor and liquidator standards, as well as the ongoing focus on advertising of financial products and the quality of financial advice.’

For the last six months some of the more notable outcomes included:

• The Federal Court of Australia imposed a penalty against Newcrest Mining Limited (Newcrest) for selectively briefing analysts on market-sensitive information ahead of it being disclosed to the market. Newcrest admitted contraventions of its continuous disclosure obligations and the court accepted ASIC and Newcrest’s joint application for the imposition of a civil penalty of $1.2 million (refer: 14-148MR).
• ASIC accepted an enforceable undertaking from BNP Paribas (BNP), which requires BNP to ensure that its participation in the setting of Australian interest rate benchmarks upholds the integrity and reliability of those benchmarks. BNP also made contributions of $1 million to fund independent financial literacy projects in Australia (refer: 14-014MR).
• Russell Johnson, a former director of Sonray Capital Markets Pty Ltd (Sonray), was sentenced to six-and-a-half years jail for his role in the collapse of Sonray, which collapsed owing more than $46 million. This sentence sends the message that company officers are expected to act with integrity and in the interests of the company. Mr Johnson has appealed the severity of his sentence (refer: 14-085MR).
• The Federal Court of Australia made declarations and ordered consumer credit provider GE Capital Finance Australia (GE Capital), which trades as GE Money, to pay a penalty of $1.5 million for making false or misleading representations to more than 700,000 of its credit card customers (refer 14-149MR).
• [This MR was redacted on 09/09/2022 in accordance with ASIC policy - see INFO 152 Public comment on ASIC's regulatory activities.]

The report also includes discussion of the life cycle of some enforcement actions taken by ASIC recently to demonstrate the factors that need to be accounted for in an enforcement action.

Download Report 402 ASIC enforcement outcomes: January to June 2014 (REP 402)

Download previous enforcement reports

Editor's Note 1:

*This release was amended on the 6th August 2015 to fix a numerical error in the third paragraph.