AMP’s chairwoman Catherine Brennar has resigned and the firm’s general counsel has left, as the company faces possible criminal charges for misleading the corporate regulator over its decade-long practice of charging undue fees to clients.
AMP could be hit with criminal charges after counsel assisting the Royal Commissioner said Friday evidence before the commission had shown the wealth management firm may have broken the law when it charged fees for no service, lied about the practice to ASIC, and presented a heavily-edited Clayton Utz report to the corporate regulator as independent.
Clayton Utz’s public statements referencing its terms of engagement with AMP in drafting an independent report are irrelevant if it knew the document was destined for the corporate regulator, legal experts say, and transcripts from the Royal Commission suggest the law firm did know.