Day 411: 'It seems no one likes us'
Counting the days since the banking royal commission was established.
Good afternoon, and welcome to day 411.
Today in summary: The banks are not invited to the media lockup for the banking royal commission final report on Monday; the ASX will closely monitor the market for signs of leaks of the report; and banking royal commission documents reveal the full depths of NAB’s naughty behaviour.
-- Alex
Current banker panic level: 😡🤬
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1. Banks will not be allowed into the media lockup for banking royal commission final report on Monday. They will have to wait until the report is released to the public after market at 4.10pm like everyone else. However, The Australian has reported that industry lobby groups such as Australian Banking Association and the Financial Services Council will be allowed to send representatives into the lockup.
2. The Australian Securities Exchange will be on the lookout for evidence of leaks of information from the banking royal commission final report between when the report is handed down to government on Friday, and when it is released to the public on Monday at 4.10pm after the market closes.
“ASX will be closely monitoring disclosure and share price and volume movements,” a spokesman for the ASX told The Australian.
3. Corporate regulator ASIC’s enforcement committee approved last year’s criminal persecution of NAB for repeated failure to report serious breaches of its financial services licences. Law requires that such breaches must be reported to ASIC within 10 days. This and other breaches by the bank and its subsidiaries were exposed during royal commission hearings in August last year and released now in new documents from the enforcement committee. The Australian’s business reporter Ben Butler writes in his exclusive:
“The documents show some of the investigations conducted by ASIC were considered so sensitive that the committee’s deliberations were kept out of the minutes.”
Butler also writes that an internal review of ASIC has revealed it should be overseen by a new Office of Enforcement and should regulate for the purpose of “deterrence, public denunciation and punishment of wrongdoing”.
Today’s burn prize: An un-named banking spokesperson
🔥🔥🔥
“It seems no-one likes us.”
Responding to the news the banks will not be able to send representatives into the media lockup for the banking royal commission final report on Monday.
The Commentariat
University of Technology, Sydney, professor of accounting Stephen Taylor writes that competence is his main concern in relation to ASIC’s assessment of low audit quality, and questions what can be gained from a report that fails to offer transparency. The corporate regulator's release of its 2017-18 Audit inspection report flagged concerns that some audit firms were failing in their work, possibly requiring further regulation.
“Apart from scare mongering, what does a review that keeps audit deficiencies hidden from public view achieve in terms of investor confidence? What do the big four themselves have to say about this? And where are the accounting bodies, institutional shareholders and the like? Why aren't they taking a position on this?”
Business correspondent Richard Gluyas – one of the many journalists at The Australian today poring over newly available documents from the banking royal commission hearings – muses about the regulatory direction of corporate watchdog ASIC.
“ASIC’s new operating model, in which commissioners supervise more but regulate less, has freed up chairman James Shipton to roam the nation’s capitals, dispensing corporal punishment to financial services executives with a rather large stick.”
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