The submission was filed by the Advisers’ Committee for Investors, a group set up after LMIM went into voluntary administration in March. The submission, made late last week, was to an Australian senate committee which is looking into the ability of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission to do its job.
In the submission, which was made public today, the ACI brought into question the role the regulator played in the downfall of LMIM’s funds and the eventual collapse of the business.
In an opening letter to the committee, ACI chairperson Simon Litster said: “Since LMIM went into voluntary administration on 19 March 2013 the ACI has become increasingly concerned over the sequence of events that has failed to protect the interests of investors both on a domestic and international basis and calls into question the structure, organization and fairness of Australia’s regulatory system.
“The handling of LMIM’s collapse by those that were granted access and responsibility has not been satisfactory. Investors have been left confused and distressed.”
Litster added that the organisation prepared its submission, based on its “practical observations stemming from the LMIM collapse and the resulting questions concerning ASIC’s role as an effective regulator of Australia’s corporate laws and laws relating to consumer protection and the regulation of financial markets, products and services”.
The relatively damning submission from the ACI catalogues the series of events which they believe led to the collapse of LMIM and its funds, which, the ACI points out, will result for some investors in the “loss of their life savings”.
The ACI represents around 40% of the funds which were managed by LMIM and has been formed through close cooperation between advisers in the Middle and Far East, Asia and Europe.
