Day 514: 'Well-paid reprobates'
Counting the days since the banking royal commission was established.
Good afternoon, and welcome to day 514.
Today in summary: Former RBA governor Bernie Fraser says the Coalition’s proposed housing scheme is alright; ASIC has plans to make financial companies supply complaints data; and APRA has published a letter giving instructions on new registration requirements for the BEAR.
-- Alex
@AlexESampson
Current banker panic level: 🙄🤐😴
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While roundly dismissed by most as a nothing policy that will have little effect, former RBA governor Bernie Fraser has said the Coalition’s proposed housing loan guarantee for first home buyers could help people “at the margin”. Fraser dismissed concerns about the scheme, also backed by Labor, causing negative equity and more defaults, saying the banks had been “burned” and were now being “pretty cautious and pretty prudent”.
“I just think that at the margin it might help a bit, but it may not fully offset the negatives on the demand side.”
Meanwhile, RiskWise Property Research CEO Doron Peleg said the scheme could have a positive “major impact” on the broader economy, and would be more effective than Labor's proposed taxation changes, supporting the market instead of further weakening it.
ASIC today announced plans to require financial companies to supply standardised data on their internal complaints handling. The corporate regulator intends to publish the information, naming the firms and their performance. It will also require firms to include complaints made on social media. The end game is for ASIC to match the dispute resolution data with complaints body AFCA’s data.
Choice and the Superannuation Consumers’ Centre responded saying superannuation firms needed to process complaints faster. ASIC proposes cutting the maximum internal dispute resolution for super funds from the 90 days set by the industry’s voluntary code to 45 days. SCC acting director Xavier O’Halloran said three months was an “exceptionally long time” to take to respond to a complaint and “we shouldn’t be letting industry write their own rules”.
Choice CEO Alan Kirkland said:
“Financial firms needs to be much better at resolving complaints when they are first made, and this needs to be firmly regulated by ASIC.”
Meanwhile, AFCA has welcomed ASIC’s proposed measures to strengthen the complaints handling process within financial firms, saying the measures would “help firms to continuously improve” and “provide a robust and accountable way to make sure the system is fully transparent”.
APRA has published a letter responding to submissions on new registration requirements for the Banking Executive Accountability Regime. The prudential regulator wrote to authorised deposit-taking institutions providing guidelines for submitting a new form.
The form must be used by small and medium ADIs to register “responsible persons”, describing the areas of responsibility attributed to that person. An accountable person is anyone who has “actual or effective senior executive responsibility” for management or control of the ADI, and in this instance for also administering the BEAR and liaising with APRA in that capacity.
🔥🔥🔥
Today’s burn prize: Choice CEO Alan Kirkland
“We should not require another royal commission before aggrieved customers receive compensation in the future.”
Nothing burns Kirkland’s biscuits like an easy ride for big business. As far as he’s concerned ASIC’s plans to make financial companies supply complaints data could not have come soon enough.
The Commentariat
It’s time to finish Hayne’s work and fix the financial advice sector, writes The Australian's wealth editor James Kirby.
“All new advisers will have to have university-standard qualifications by 2024, but the system must be policed by a new agency so the industry never again throws up the crop of well-paid reprobates we saw at Hayne’s inquiry. Let’s hope whoever wins the election gets back to work immediately in finishing the reforms the Hayne commission began only a few months ago.”
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