ASIC boasts $830m record civil penalties

ASIC has scored a whopping $830 million in civil penalty orders in the last financial year alone, a Freedom of Information (FOI) request revealed.

The FOI obtained by Lambros Photios, the founder of technology services and artificial intelligence (AI) consultancy Adaca, showed ASIC already clocked $423.8 million in civil penalties at the end of April.

A further $300.2 million civil penalty against collapsed contracts for difference (CFD) issuer Union Standard International Group and its former authorised representative was booked in June.

The court ordered $156.7 million in penalties be paid by Union Standard, while $114.1 million in penalties was allocated to EuropeFX and $29.4 million to TradeFred.

The balance of the $830 million included fines for Mercer Super totalling $10.3 million for systemic failures to report investigations into significant member services issues to ASIC and HSBC Bank Australia admitting to serious failures in protecting customers from scams that cost it $35 million.

The Federal Court also recently ordered Westpac to pay a $26 million penalty for widespread failures in responding to customer hardship requests.

Adaca's analysis of the FOI data found the case count has not moved, yet the penalties have.

The regulator lodged 29 civil proceedings in the 10 months to April 2026, roughly in line with the 33-per-year average across the previous decade. What has changed is the size of the penalty each action produces, Adaca found.

The 29 infringement notices issued equated to a total of $8.3 million - which has been the largest amount since 2015-16, followed by the 20 issued in 2023-24 amounting to $7.2 million.

Off the back of the FOI request, ASIC chair Sarah Court said $644 million is being paid back to Australians, including more than $61 million announced in the first half of 2026, on top of the $583 million announced between June and December 2025.

"We are pursuing cases that expose serious failures in systems, governance and conduct, from scams and hardship failures to market infrastructure, superannuation, private credit, financial reporting, and digital assets," she said.

"ASIC has delivered record penalties and strong criminal outcomes, but enforcement is not just about punishment. It is about detecting misconduct sooner, preventing harm where we can, and securing remediation for those affected."