Cancellation of company auditor registration for independence failures – September 5, 2025

ASIC has accepted Allan William Donald’s application to cancel his registration as a company auditor after concerns that he did not comply with the independence requirements under the Corporations Act 2001, and the APES 110 Code of Ethics for Professional Accountants (including Independence Standards).

The concern related to his work as auditor for two related large proprietary companies between 1992 and 2022, where ASIC believed he did not comply with his independence requirements by having:

• engaged in audit activities at the same time as being company secretary of the audited bodies – which constituted a prohibited relationship;
• provided prohibited non-assurance services to the audited body; and
• maintained a long association with the audit clients without having proper independence threat assessments and safeguards in place.

Donald submitted that his independence breaches were inadvertent, and cooperated with the Commission’s inquiries.

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SocGen fined A$3.88m for market gatekeeper failures – September 2, 2025

Societe Generale Securities Australia Pty Limited (SocGen), one of the largest participants in the ASX 24 Market, has been fined A$3.88m ($2.5m) for failing to prevent suspicious orders from being placed on the electricity and wheat futures market.

The fine was brought by the Market Disciplinary Panel (MDP) following an ASIC investigation, where SocGen was found to be violating market integrity rules when it allowed two of its clients to place 33 suspicious orders between May 2023 and February 2024.

The orders were placed during a volatile period caused by supply issues, such as the Russia-Ukrainian War, where MDP found that “SocGen should have suspected that all 33 orders were submitted with the intention of creating a false or misleading appearance in the market.”

ASIC contacted SocGen on five occasions in 2023 to serve notices, ask questions or raise concerns about volatility in futures markets and the suspicious orders, yet it failed to take timely and effective action, ASIC Chair Joe Longo said.

“SocGen’s lack of response and inadequate remediation were made more significant because it is the second largest participant in the ASX 24 Market.”

Joe Longo, Chair, ASIC

SocGen has not contested the alleged breaches of Rule 3.1.2(1)(b)(iii) of the ASIC Market Integrity Rules (Futures Markets) 2017, has complied with the Infringement Notice, and paid the penalty.

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Former adviser Milutin Petrovic banned for six years – September 1, 2025

Milutin Petrovic, former financial adviser at United Global Capital Pty Ltd (UGC), has been banned from working within the financial business services for six years after failing key advice obligations.

He advised his clients to set up a self-managed superannuation fund (SMSF) and to then invest a significant portion of their retirement savings in the Global Capital Property Fund Limited (GCPF), a related property investment company which now is in liquidation.

Petrovic was found to be failing to act in clients’ best interests, and not providing suitable advice. He also prioritized UGC interests instead of the clients, made statements that were likely to be misleading, and gave defective Statements of Advice.

Petrovic has applied to the Administrative Review Tribunal for a review of the decision, including applying for stay and confidentiality orders which has been withdrawn.

Joel James Hewish, the director of UGC, was earlier in July 2024 banned from providing or performing services within the financial services business for 10 years due to being involved in UGC’s conduct as the responsible manager and key person under the license.

UGC’s AFS license was also canceled, and the company was placed into voluntary administration.

ASIC also obtained interim orders in June 2024 to freeze the assets of UGC and GCPF in order to protect investor funds during its investigation into the alleged conduct.

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Brett Trevillian permanently banned – September 1, 2025

The investment manager Brett Paul Trevillian has been permanently banned from providing financial services and engaging in credit activities following his conviction for serious fraud.

Earlier in November 2024, Trevillian pleaded guilty to two counts of making a false document to obtain a financial advantage, breaching section 253 of the Crimes Act (NSW), and was sentenced to three years imprisonment.

Between April and October 2019, Trevillian was found forging four portfolio performance verification reports relating to two products offerings by AlphaThorn.

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Court updates

James Mawhinney handed 15-year injunctions – September 5, 2025

The Federal Court has handed injunctions on James Mawhinney, director of Mayfair 101 Group, where he will be unable to promote or raise funds connected with financial products for 15 years after proceedings brought by ASIC.

The Federal Court found Mawhinney had a “cavalier attitude to compliance” and a “willingness to adopt a reckless approach to the conduct of a financial services business.” Justice Button said that Mawhinney didn’t care about meeting investor obligations, and that his only plan was to raise more money from them.

“The operations established and run by Mr Mawhinney exposed investors to an obvious and substantial risk of loss, which risk materialised, resulting in investors suffering heavy losses.”

Justice Button

The injunctions follow earlier proceedings in July, where Mawhinney was found to have been associated with or involved in contraventions of the law.

The Group was also found to have made multiple false or misleading representations while marketing M+ Fixed Income Notes, M Core Fixed Income Notes, and Australian Property Bonds between July 3, 2019, and May 5, 2020. And the Group was found to have engaged in misleading or deceptive conduct by failing to disclose in marketing material that investor redemptions had been suspended, and that Group company IPO Capital carried on a financial services business without a license.

The four companies in the Mayfair 101 Group were also ordered to pay a combined penalty of A$30m ($19.7m) by the Federal Court in December 2021 for misleading or deceptive advertising.

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ASIC granted special leave to appeal Block Earner decision – September 5, 2025

The High Court has granted ASIC special leave to appeal the Full Federal Court decision where the digital asset service provider Block Earner was found not to be needing a financial services license to offer a fixed-yield digital asset-related product.

The appeal seeks the High Court’s ruling on what falls within the definition of a financial product, including clarification on when interest-earning products and products involving the conversion of assets from one form into another are regulated.

In November 2023, ASIC commenced civil penalty proceedings against Block Earner over allegedly providing unlicensed financial services connected to its crypto-asset based products, and for operating an unregistered managed investment scheme.

In February 2024, the Federal Court found that Block Earner had engaged in unlicensed financial services conduct when offering its Earner product, yet relieved it from paying a penalty in June. ASIC appealed the decision.

In July, Block Earner cross-appealed the Federal Court’s decision that it needed a financial services license to offer its Earner product – which the Full Federal Court allowed in April 2025, dismissing ASIC’s appeal.

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Chris Marco guilty of fraud totalling more than A$34m – September 5, 2025

The businessman Chris Marco has been found guilty of 43 fraud charges totalling A$34,332,453 ($22,471,631) relating to six investors. According to a four-year investigation by ASIC, Marco obtained the millions between July 2013 and October 2018 with the intent to defraud, by deceit or fraudulent means.

He will remain in custody until sentencing on October 30.

Linda Marissen, Marco’s former executive assistant, was earlier charged with 30 counts of fraud but was acquitted of all charges.

These charges followed earlier Federal Court proceedings in December 2020 against Marco and AMS Holdings (WA) Pty Ltd, a company previously run by him. The Court ordered the winding up of the unregistered managed investment scheme which was operated by both parties. Marco was also permanently restrained from carrying on a financial services business without an AFS Licence or operating an unregistered managed investment scheme.

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Dismissed appeals by Latitude and Harvey Norman – September 4, 2025

The Full Federal Court has dismissed “barely arguable” appeals by Latitude Finance Australia and Harvey Norman Holdings Ltd over earlier charges of misleading conduct and false or misleading representations.

“The decision of the primary judge is not attended by any real doubt and that the draft grounds of appeal lack merit and are barely arguable.”

Justices O’Bryan, Cheeseman and Bennett

In October 2024, both companies were found to have engaged in misleading conduct by the Federal Court, violating sections 12DA, 12DB and 12DF of the ASIC Act. The conduct related an advertising campaign that contained false information, which was published in newspapers, and on TV and radio, between January 2020 and August 2021. They promoted a ‘60-month interest free and no deposit payment method’ – when in fact customers had to take out a credit card to make purchases.

Justice Yates said at that hearing that customers had to enter “a fundamentally different financial arrangement than the one promoted” – specifically a continuing credit contract with Latitude with a linked credit card, which made them pay an “establishment fee and ongoing monthly account service fees in respect of that linked account.”

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Charges discontinued against former Bruck Textile Technologies officers – September 3, 2025

The charges against the former Chair Philip James Bart and Chief Financial Officer Ronald George Johnson of Bruck Textile Technologies Pty Ltd have been discontinued.

Both had previously been committed to stand trial on one charge each of preventing the recovery of employee entitlements – violations of sections 596AB and 1311 of the Corporations Act.

The decision follows the Victorian Court of Appeal’s case stated judgment on questions of law in relation to the interpretation of the offence legislation, in DPP (Cth) v Bart [2025] VSCA 161 (7 July 2025).

Former company CEO Geoffrey Thomas Parker pleaded earlier in April 2024 guilty to the same charge on indictment, and was sentenced to two years and six months imprisonment with immediate release.

In July 2014, the company went into liquidation following the sale of the company’s assets to a related entity, and 58 employees lost their jobs and entitlements, including redundancy payments.

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Gym director convicted of making false statement to ASIC – September 1, 2025

Jye Dilin Menzies-Clifton has been convicted and released without passing sentence upon entering a 12-month good behavior bond after pleading guilty to one count of authorizing the making of a false statement in a document lodged with ASIC. A breach section 1308(1) of the Corporations Act.

Menzies-Clifton was earlier the director of Strong and Co Australia Pty Ltd, where he in November 2021 authorized the deregistration of the company in November 2021. The lodged form contained false statements such as that the company had no outstanding liabilities, and that all company members agreed to the deregistration.

The company did in fact owe A$58,186.55 ($38,135) to the Australian Taxation Office, and A$14,190 ($9,300) in lease debts to the gym’s landlord.

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Open4Sale Global directors fined A$2.8m – September 1, 2025

Open4Sale’s managing director Simeon La Barrie and Australian director Ewald Hafer have been fined for breaching disclosure laws.

On August 29, the Federal Court found that the duo breached the law on 101 occasions between March 2019 and July 2023 when they raised over A$1.3m ($852,419) from 83 investors and failed to provide compliant disclosure documentation to ASIC or investors. A breach of s727(6) of the Corporations Act 2001 (Cth).

In pitch decks, Open4Sale made unverified claims that it would make $57 billion in revenue in five years without having any basis to cover the forecasts. It was instead found to have generated no income between 2016 and 2022, and accumulated close to A$9m ($5.9m) in net losses.

La Barrie was also found to have transferred over A$1.4m ($917,988m) of investor funds to his own accounts and used some of it to pay for personal expenses such as rent and school fees.

Hafer, who received A$137,975 ($90,444) in commissions since 2019, was found to be breaching the Corporations Act by continuing to raise money from investors even though there was no accompanying disclosure document.

La Barrie, who also was found referring to shareholders as “idiots” in professional correspondence on two occasions, was fined A$2m ($1.3m), and Hafer A$800,000 ($524,443). The Court did however decline order penalties against Open4Sale.

La Barrie was also disqualified from managing corporations for 12 years, and Hafer for eight years. Both La Barrie and Open4Sale are also restrained from future non-compliant fundraising for 12 years, and Hafer for eight years.

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Cancelled licenses

Three cancelled credit licenses and one suspended – September 3, 2025

Three Australian credit licenses have been cancelled and one suspended after firms failure to hold a required Australian Financial Complaints Authority (AFCA) membership.

• APL Lending Pty Ltd – license suspended on August 4.
• Crown Home Loans & Finance Pty Ltd – license cancelled on August 29.
• Mortgage Origination Pty Ltd – license cancelled July 25.
• Po Hsiung Chai – license cancelled August 13.

The failures varied around failings of:

• being a member of AFCA;
• lodging annual compliance certificates on time;
• paying industry funding levies to ASIC; and/or
• to have ceased engaging in credit activities.

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ASIC news week 36

August 2025 financial adviser exam results

Of the 221 people taking the 30th Financial Advisers Exam cycle exam:  

• 68.78% (152) passed; and
• 73% (162) took the exam for the first time.

To date, 22,153 individuals have taken the exam, with 20,546 (92%) people passing it. The next exam will be on November 6, 2025.

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ASIC calls for further regulatory simplification proposals

ASIC has culled more than 9,240 pages of regulation since the start of the year, its new report Regulatory Simplification shows. The report is the ‘first milestone’ in the agency’s work towards more simpler, clearer regulation.

“Since we formed the ASIC Simplification Consultative Group late last year with key leaders across business, industry, and consumer groups, we have been focused on simplifying how we regulate,” said ASIC Chair Joe Longo.

The report outlines ASIC’s initiatives in areas such as:

• improving access to regulatory information;
• reducing complexity in regulatory instruments; and
• making it easier to interact with ASIC.

The work continues, and ASIC seeks more input on how to make further changes.

“This is a multi-year program of work and we want to hear more about what we should consider for our next steps and initiatives,” Longo added.

Feedback can be submitted until October 15.

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Regulatory reform correspondence

ASIC published its correspondence with the Treasurer related to regulatory reform opportunities:

August 1: Letter from ASIC to the Treasurer – Regulatory reform opportunities

August 12: Supplementary letter from ASIC to Treasurer – Productivity roundtable