The Australian unit of French investment bank Société Générale must pay a $30,000 penalty after pleading guilty to four counts of breaching client money handling rules.
Former celebrity advisor and banking royal commission witness Sam Henderson has avoided jail time and been fined $10,000 after pleading guilty to dishonesty and defective disclosure offences for falsely telling clients he had completed a Master of Commerce degree.
A judge has slapped National Australia Bank with a $15 million penalty over its scandal-ridden home loan introducer program but slammed ASIC’s investigation into the program, saying there was no “real regulatory desire to pursue a thorough investigation as to what in truth occurred”.
Over-the-counter derivative issuers AGM Markets, OT Markets and Oxifin Tech have been ordered to pay a total of $75 million in penalties after a ruling that they engaged in unconscionable conduct causing losses of over $30 million to unsophisticated investors seeking what a judge called “financial heroin hits”.
The director of the besieged Mayfair investment group will submit a new noteholder proposal to the court in an effort to stave off the winding up of M101 Nominees and salvage his multi-million dollar Dunk Island and Mission Beach investments.
In a win for ASIC, a judge has found that former oil and gas company Antares Energy violated its continuous disclosure obligations by failing to reveal the name of the buyer behind an ill-fated US$254 million acquisition of Texan oil assets.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has settled its responsible lending case against Volkswagen’s financial services unit with an undertaking from the car financier to repay customers $4.7 million.
ASIC and the applicant in a class action against GetSwift have intervened in an application by the logistics provider to relocate its headquarters to Canada, aiming to ensure shareholders are aware of the potential outcomes of the regulator’s enforcement action, which include banning orders against directors Bane Hunter and Joel Macdonald.
The Australian Securities and Investments Commission has dropped its investigation into trading firm Select Vantage, which brought an unsuccessful $10 million defamation suit against the regulator.
McMillan Shakespeare has settled a class action alleging one of its units engaged in unfair tactics and unconscionable conduct in the sale of car warranties that offered “no benefit or value” to consumers.