ASIC one of the most active enforcers in the world: Longo

ASIC had been in court “pretty much every business day” this year, Ms Court said, and was “not conservative in the cases we take on”.

She said the regulator used more than court actions to force compliance from companies, pointing to surveillance activity and director bans.

“When we talk about enforcement … they tend to be assuming we’re talking about court actions,” she said. “[But] enforcement is a tool that gets us towards compliance, but so are a whole lot of other tools.”

Outlining ASIC’s enforcement priorities for next year, which account for around half of the regulator’s resourcing in that division, Ms Court said the new focuses on superannuation, as well as companies’ insurance claims handling and compliance with financial hardship obligations, would come under more scrutiny.

It comes as customer complaints about super funds soar and providers face an unprecedented flurry of regulatory action and political scrutiny in response.

“In the coming year, we will maintain our enforcement focus in the superannuation area, focusing both on member service failures and misconduct that results in the systemic erosion of superannuation balances,” Ms Court said.

It builds on existing cases against AustralianSuper, Mercer Super, TelstraSuper and Active Super.

The TelstraSuper case specifically targets alleged customer service failures – the first time ASIC has taken a fund to court for this type of alleged misconduct – while the AustralianSuper case relates to failures to consolidate funds eroding balances.

Longo hits back

Mr Longo said ASIC was “probably the most active law enforcement agency in our space, not only nationally, but globally”.

“That’s not just me saying that, that’s what the evidence and the facts show,” he said.

“We are committed to enforcement, it’s targeted, and there’s going to be more of it, not less. There’s already been a lot of it, and you can expect more of it.”

Asked about the decision to scrap ASIC’s annual report card on the big four accounting firms and accusations the commission was under-resourced in its scrutiny of mergers and acquisitions, fundraisings and listings, Mr Longo said he was satisfied with the regulator’s strategy.

“I am fully satisfied the resourcing strategy we are adopting with financial reports is the right one – it’s modern, it’s targeted, it’s risk-based, and that’s what you should expect from ASIC,” he said.

Asked about his comments at the forum in response to federal Treasurer Jim Chalmers to “make sure they are properly resourced”, he said ASIC was taking on additional responsibilities.

“I think the resources issue is always going to be an issue for all regulators. I think what will be interesting in the next period of time is there are a whole range of new responsibilities which ASIC is likely to get, or expanded, so we will see how the next budget goes.”