ASIC tightens conditions for dealers
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has add further conditions to the dealer’s licences held by two financial planning groups.
The conditions imposed upon the planning arms of Pacific General Securities Limited and Trust Company of Australia Limited were consistent with those ASIC rolled out in May this year.
At that time the regulator said it would publish notices of special conditions being imposed to assist the financial planning industry and notify the public regarding the action taken by ASIC.
ASIC says it has released the special conditions regarding Pacific General, also trading as Wealthy & Wise, after ASIC conducted routine surveillance and found in some case the group’s adviser’s may not determine fully or consider the risk tolerance of some clients when making recommendations relating to investment products.
Other concerns of ASIC include whether the group had appropriate monitoring and compliance reviews of advisers and if the advisers correctly disclosed to their client the commissions they received.
ASIC also reviewed the Trust Company and in particular its’ licence as the regulator was notified that clients may have received advice from planners under Trust Company’s control but did not have an authority to do so.
Both groups have agreed to work with ASIC and will appoint an independent consultant to examine compliance monitoring of advisers. The consultant will report to ASIC regarding the effectiveness of the compliance systems within the two groups who must act to any appropriate findings.
AUTHOR
Jason Spits
Recommended for you
Large wealth management players are increasingly taking an opportunistic approach to their M&A deals rather than a strategic one, while a fear of missing out is driving smaller players to consider selling up.
More than $2 billion in investment activity was recorded for Australian fintech firms last year, according to KPMG, with the GDG/Lonsec acquisition proving to be a notable deal in the second half.
Praemium has stated it is seeking accretive acquisition opportunities in the area of non-custodial solutions where it believes it can further grow its dominant market share.
Iress chief executive Marcus Price has shared how he is seeing “massive tailwinds” in financial advice in Australia, with the firm turning its attention to digital advice following the completion of its transformation project.
