Scams and governance failures dominate tip-offs to ASIC

The corporate watchdog received around 9800 tip-offs of misconduct from the public in the first six months of the year.

Retail investor issues and governance matters continued to dominate reports received by ASIC, which together accounted for over four in five of all reports.

Common concerns in the reports included unlicensed financial services, governance failures, insolvency concerns and failures to provide company books and records to liquidators.

Retail investor issues included credit issues, general licence obligations, unregistered managed investment schemes, unlicensed provision of financial services conduct, and other conduct related to advice, insurance, and misleading and deceptive or unconscionable behaviour.

Around 1950 of the complaints were of unregistered managed investment scheme operations or firms providing financial services without an Australian financial services licence.

On the other hand, corporations and corporate governance included fraud allegations, corporate governance issues, registered liquidator conduct, insolvency matters, shareholder issues, reporting issues and failure to provide books and records on company activities and property to registered liquidators.

ASIC chair Sarah Court said: "The data ASIC receives provides critical insights into the trending issues facing consumers and businesses, helping to inform our enforcement priorities. We continue to welcome tip-offs from the public."

One hundred seventy of the reports directly assisted ASIC with existing surveillance or investigation matters, while 351 reports raised issues that were linked to other reports and were considered together.

ASIC noted reports from the public have helped take swift action against emerging pump-and-dump scams, which are becoming increasingly sophisticated using fake celebrity endorsements, causing substantial harm to Australian investors.

"ASIC encourages members of the public to continue reporting suspected misconduct to help identify patterns and trends," Court said.

"Reports from the public remain a vital source of intelligence for ASIC, that help us identify consumer harm and to target resources where they will have the greatest deterrence and consumer benefit."