The Advisers Committee for Investors (ACI) identified this as one of its key achievements to date, one year on from its formation, in its executive committee report covering the period since LMIM went into Voluntary Administration in March 2013.
In the June report on the performance of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission, the ACI was quoted as stating that the ASIC failed to take “substantial early steps to deal decisively with the causes and results of this corporate collapse contrast starkly with the quick action and early prosecutions after the Bernie Madoff scandal broke in the United States.”
According to ACI chairman Simon Litste, who represents Japan for the group, the Senate Report is quite damning on the ASIC‘s role with not just the ACI “pointing a finger at a tardy regulator. Nevertheless, we take comfort from the fact that our efforts and protests have reached government”.
The ACI grew from a small core of IFAs who designed and signed a charter in June 2013, and now has a spread of advisers across Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
In a statement, Mondial CEO Sean Kelleher, who represents the Middle East grouping, said: “Back-stabbing competition was the normal standard for the offshore IFA universe, but ironically, the Australian disaster that is LMIM, has provided one of the few reasons to work with our competitors.”
While Financial Partners chairman Peter Kende, for Hong Kong, said: “We trusted Australia and so far there has been a highly limited reaction to an investment managed in Australia, subject to Australian Corporate Governance rules, and subject to Australian best practice business principles. We hope the Senate Report represents a wind of change that favours investors”.
