A recent decision of the Victorian Court of Appeal has given a wide meaning to the Code of Banking Practice finding that the duty of care owed by a lender in assessing the borrowers ability to repay extends to guarantors Effectively the bank was responsible to guarantordirectors for funding their ...

The FSI report recommended that the Government facilitate rationalisation of legacy products in the life insurance and managed investment scheme industries The need for ways to close legacy products has been kicking around for at least a decade and in 2007 Treasury released a very thorough options ...

Housing affordability climate change and energy efficiency are key focuses of the discussion paper recently released by the Victorian Planning Minster which aims to refresh the current Melbourne Metropolitan Planning strategy Plan Melbourne The paper draws upon the detailed report prepared by the ...

You might be getting tired of all of the talk about innovation and keen to see some of it actually happen The Governments recent announcements could help but there is a long way to go before the mining boom becomes the ideas boom ...

The new package of legislation overhauling Australias foreign investment laws the first major revision in 40 years commenced on 1 December 2015 While many features of the previous regime have been retained and sometimes re-named there are also a number of significant changes Partners Jeremy Low ...

The Australian Government has announced that in applying the national interest test to future foreign investment applications it will be requiring investors to satisfy a series of tax compliance and disclosure obligations relating to the tax implications of the proposed investment and the ...

In response to recent confirmation that Iran has met its international nuclear commitments the Australian Government has lifted all nuclear-related economic and financial sanctions against that country ...

A long-awaited change designed to reduce the compliance burden for security interests arising from short-term leases of serial numbered goods is one step closer to becoming law Partner Karla Fraser and Law Graduate Katharine Ward report ...

Issues of securities interests in managed investment schemes and other types of financial products typically involve a number of designated services under Australias anti-money laundering and counter terrorism financing AMLCTF regime However in the midst of preparing governing documents disclosure ...

This week ASIC flagged a change in its approach to the exercise of its power to make orders to recover expenses and costs associated with investigations Information Sheet 204 indicates that ASIC will be making greater use of this power to seek recovery of its costs from individuals and companies ...