Conclusion

The financial advice industry is part way through transformation from an industry dedicated to the sale of financial products to a profession concerned with the provision of financial advice. The interests of Australians who seek financial advice require that that Read More …

4.2 A new approach to discipline

As I said at the start of this section of the chapter, a coherent system of professional discipline must be established for financial advisers. The system should have the following key features. First, each financial adviser should be individually registered. Read More …

4.1 Existing arrangements

4.1.1 AFSL holders As mentioned earlier in this chapter, a key principle in CLERP 6 was to regulate intermediaries (including financial advisers) at firm level rather than at the individual level, in part to allow ASIC to target its resources Read More …

Introduction

The third matter that emerged in connection with the provision of financial advice related to the disciplinary system for financial advisers. That system now consists of a number of bodies, each directed at regulating different, though related, norms of behaviour, Read More …

3.3 Reducing or eliminating the conflict

As I said in the Interim Report,[1] and have repeated above, consideration of conflicts between duty and interest begins from two simple observations: So long as advisers stand to benefit financially from clients acting on the advice that is given, Read More …

3.2 Can conflicts be managed better?

Accepting, for the moment, the premise of the FoFA reforms – that conflicts of duty and interest exist, must be recognised and should be ‘managed’ – the question that presents itself is: is there more that could be done to Read More …

3.1 Conflicts of duty and interest

As I said in the Interim Report,[1] consideration of conflicts of interest, or more accurately, conflicts between duty and interest, begins from two simple points: So long as advisers stand to benefit financially from clients acting on the advice that Read More …