From today’s ASIC media release: ASIC has commenced civil penalty proceedings in the Federal Court against five companies that are, or were, part of the AMP Limited group, alleging that these entities were involved in charging life insurance premiums and advice fees to more than 2,000 customers despite being notified of their death. The relevant companies (AMP Companies) are: AMP Superannuation Limited; NM Superannuation Proprietary Limited; AMP Life Limited, which is now owned by Resolution Life NZ, but was part of AMP when the conduct occurred; AMP Financial Planning Proprietary Limi ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: ASIC has commenced proceedings in the Federal Court in Brisbane against PE Capital Funds Management Ltd (PE Capital Funds Management) alleging misconduct in relation to the operation of managed investment schemes. Following an investigation, ASIC alleges that PE Capital Funds Management: - operated the following unregistered managed investment schemes (the Unregistered Schemes) in circumstances where these unregistered schemes should be registered: PE Capital Property Development Opportunities Fund (P1 Fund); PE Capital Property Development Opportunities Fu ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: ASIC has banned Sydney-based former financial adviser, Lisa Lee, from providing financial services for eight years. Ms Lee was a representative of Australia and New Zealand Banking Group Limited (ANZ) between 5 June 2010 and 15 June 2017 and Infocus Securities Australia Pty Ltd between 19 September 2017 and 19 November 2018. She is no longer providing financial advice. ASIC found that while a representative of ANZ, Ms Lee falsely witnessed binding nomination of beneficiary forms for 17 clients, backdated documents, and falsified a client’s signature on document ..read more

From today’s ASIC Media Release: The Federal Court has found companies in the Mayfair 101 Group made statements that were false, misleading or deceptive in advertisements for its debenture products, following proceedings brought by ASIC in April 2020. The Court found Mayfair Wealth Partners Pty Ltd trading as Mayfair Platinum, Online Investments Pty Ltd trading as Mayfair 101, M101 Nominees Pty Ltd and M101 Holdings Pty Ltd, engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct, and made false or misleading representations, by representing that: Mayfair’s debenture products were comparable to, and of s ..read more

See below relevant news coverage (behind pay walls): https://www.lawyerly.com.au/fair-trial-may-not-be-possible-for-adviser-targeted-by-asic-in-ioof-unit-case-court-told/ https://www.lawyerly.com.au/financial-adviser-drops-defence-in-asics-bad-advice-case-against-ioof-unit/ https://www.lawyerly.com.au/asic-proves-prescient-with-failure-of-mediation-on-eve-of-ioof-trial ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: 21-021MR ASIC imposes additional licence conditions on Poynter Hargraves Financial Consultants Pty Ltd ASIC has imposed additional conditions on the Australian financial services (AFS) licence of Poynter Hargraves Financial Consultants Pty Ltd (Poynter Hargraves). This follows a targeted surveillance by ASIC that found Poynter Hargraves had poor risk controls around conflict management and was not adequately monitoring and supervising its representatives. ASIC’s surveillance also found that some clients were provided with financial advice that failed to meet th ..read more

This week the writer appeared in the Federal Court for a client at a Case Management Hearing. At the hearing, the First and Second Defendants both advised Justice Moshinsky that they would agree to a Court ordered mediation before a Court appointed Registrar. When asked by His Honour for ASIC’s position, ASIC argued that mediation would be ‘completely futile’ and Counsel’s instructions were that ASIC did not agree to a mediation of the matter. Despite ASIC’s position, His Honour did order for mediation to occur in the matter. Link (behind a paywall) to an article in Lawerly on the above: https ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: ASIC has banned Sydney-based financial adviser Jim Pavlidis from providing financial services for three years. A review of Mr Pavlidis’ advice between 2004 and 2018 found that he failed to provide financial advice that was in the best interests of his clients and to keep proper records. Mr Pavlidis failed to consider the relevant circumstances of each client and left client objectives unaddressed.  ASIC also found that Mr Pavlidis was not adequately trained and did not have a proper understanding of the requirements to competently provide financial service ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: On 23 December 2020, ASIC commenced civil penalty proceedings in the Federal Court against Squirrel Superannuation Services Pty Ltd (Squirrel) for false or misleading representations. Squirrel is a financial technology company that holds an Australian financial services licence (AFSL). ASIC alleges that from around January 2015, Squirrel marketed and sold services helping customers establish and operate self-managed superannuation funds (SMSF) to purchase established residential property. In March 2015, Squirrel first published and distributed a brochure headed ..read more

From today’s ASIC media release: Keith James Flowers, formerly known as Nigel Flowers, of Bathurst, New South Wales, has appeared before Downing Street District Court Sydney and pleaded guilty to one charge of acting dishonestly as a company director and one charge of theft. Mr Flowers was the director of Flowers Financial Group Pty Ltd (in liquidation) and Flowers Financial Management Pty Ltd (in liquidation), which specialised in providing financial advice to the medical profession. During 2011, Mr Flowers was a registered financial adviser and engaged in a scheme to raise money to fund a pr ..read more