Corporate culture and its role in shaping conduct within the financial services sector is now clearly at the forefront of ASICs enforcement agenda This focus was apparent in ASICs 2014-2015 strategic outlook released in October 2014 which identified corporate culture as a key risk driver and poor ...

The Supreme Court of Queensland has concluded that landlords of pre-30 June 2009 commercial leases in Queensland are entitled to recover land tax from tenants from 30 June 2010, despite earlier legislation which purported to restrict such recovery. ...

After months of political stalemate in negotiations with its creditors to unlock access to bailout funds the Greek government has announced a referendum on proposed bailout conditions an extended bank holiday and the imposition of capital controls ...

The level of public interest and popular support for regulation targeting excessive surcharging makes card payment regulation likely to be one of the first areas of reform following the publication of the Final Report of the Financial System Inquiry the FSI Report ...

ASIC has published draft rules for mandatory central clearing of certain derivatives while Treasury has published draft regulations that would permit single-sided reporting of Over-the-Counter Derivatives in some situations Partner Tom Highnam and Lawyer David Lewis discuss the implications of these ...

In the aftermath of the global financial crisis governments and regulators have been busy identifying ways to better protect the financial system from future shocks Among these are measures for arming financial regulators with a more comprehensive crisis management toolkit Of particular concern are ...

The Australian corporate debt market is primed for growth, with an increase in the number of funds providing direct lending as an alternative source of financing to the traditional lending dominated by domestic banks. ...

From 1 July 2015 sellers and landlords will be able to enter into sales and leases which are the result of unsolicited offers or which involve only wholly-owned subsidiaries without the need to first provide a building energy efficiency certificate following amendments to federal legislation Partner ...

In 2014 ASIC started promoting the use of behavioural economics in its regulatory activities Two reports recently released by ASIC provide clues as to how ASIC may try to counteract behavioural biases in the future ...

In an important ruling the High Court has decided that a purchaser of leased premises will make a supply of the leased premises when after completion the purchaser observes its express obligations under the lease The decision provides much-needed certainty for vendors and purchasers of leased ...