A magistrate has dismissed a bid to expand the cross examination of a JPMorgan witness in the closely watched criminal cartel case over a $2.5 billion ANZ share placement, calling it a “back door” attempt to bypass a prior court ruling.
The State of Queensland will not appeal a ruling that found it, as well as the operators of two Queensland dams, were negligent in the 2011 floods in the Southeast region of the state that left over 2,000 homes destroyed.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has raised concerns about Asahi’s proposed $16 billion acquisition of Carlton & United Breweries, saying the deal would likely reduce competition in the cider market and could also impact on the beer market.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission will get an additional $26.9 million to take on Google and Facebook, but the Federal Government will proceed more slowly in implementing some of the more wide-ranging proposals in the regulator’s final digital platforms report, including suggested changes to privacy and merger review laws.
A committal hearing in the ANZ cartel case may run a further nine days next year due to ongoing arguments about subpoenas and privilege, which have derailed five planned days of cross-examination of key witnesses and led a Local Court Magistrate to proclaim she was “awful close” to ending her life.
The competititon regulator has flagged concerns about the proposed merger of educational publishing giants Cengage and McGraw-Hill, saying it could substantially lessen competition and drive up textbook prices.
A shareholder of struggling gold company Orinoco Gold has been granted limited access to the company’s books after the firm was placed into administration on the back of an abysmal year on the ASX which saw it share value plummet by more than 97 per cent.
The Australian liquidator of Lehman Brothers has filed a lawsuit seeking $40 million from Fitch Ratings for assigning too-rosy ratings to toxic financial products sold by the bank, following the discovery of a hidden table in Fitch’s rating model by the lawyers leading a now-settled class action against the accounting firm.
The judge overseeing the settlement approval process in multiple class actions against Volkswagen over the diesel emissions scandal has criticised an application for a common fund order by the funder backing two Bannister Law-led lawsuits.
CBA subsidiary Avanteos Investments Limited has been hit with extra conditions on its superannuation licence by the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority after it was revealed the investment management firm charged fees to thousands of deceased superannuation members.