ASIC continued its strong focus on enforcement action in the last financial year, driving positive outcomes for consumers and small businesses, and maintaining trust and integrity in Australia’s financial system.
Releasing ASIC’s 2022–23 Annual Report, Chair Joe Longo said ASIC actively litigated and sought significant penalties to address misconduct.
‘Our enforcement action resulted in 35 criminal convictions and almost $190 million in civil penalties and fines imposed by the courts. In addition, we commenced more than 130 new investigations in 2022–23.’
‘ASIC remains focused on maximising our regulatory impact by addressing areas of greatest harm. Our priorities reflect the key trends and emerging issues in our regulatory environment, including the growth in sustainable finance, Australia’s ageing population, emerging and disruptive digital technologies and associated risks, and product design and distribution.’
‘We have made considerable progress against these priorities throughout the year, and this work continues.’
Key outcomes include our first enforcement action for alleged greenwashing, disrupting predatory conduct aimed at vulnerable consumers and small businesses, targeting poorly designed products with our stop order powers, taking action against breaches of directors’ duties, reviewing the cyber resilience practices of Australian business, and focusing on scam prevention and detection by the major banks.
Over the last seven years, ASIC has overseen more than $7 billion of remediation to an estimated 8.42 million Australian consumers for failures we identified across the financial services industry.
‘There are a significant number of ongoing investigations and surveillance activities that we will report on in the year ahead,’ Chair Longo added.
‘We have a sharp focus on achieving positive outcomes for consumers and small business. We will continue to work with our stakeholders and financial industry participants to improve conduct and strengthen trust in the system, as well as enforce the law to greatest effect.’