ASIC released the data in response to a question on notice from One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts around the total dollar cost to banks as a result of ASIC’s recent enforcement actions.
The regulator said that since 1 January 2019, it had obtained $109 million in civil penalties against authorised deposit-taking institutions (ADIs).
ASIC said it had also successfully brought three civil actions against banks where court declarations were made against them or the bank agreed to comply with the orders sought by ASIC, and obtained one criminal conviction resulting in a $700,000 fine.
In addition, the regulator had achieved three negotiated outcomes resulting in $16.4 million in compensation for affected consumers, and one administrative outcome resulting in an ADI having conditions placed on its AFSL.
The news comes as ASIC is poised to retire its ‘why not litigate’ stance adopted since the royal commission, with the appointment of new chair Joe Longo.
Mr Longo recently told a parliamentary committee that while the strategy had been “useful”, it was likely the regulator would take a more selective approach to taking cases to court going forward.
“Not every matter is going to end up in court – there will be times where we won’t take action because the matter does not warrant it,” he said.
“For those of us who have been around a while, we know that launching court proceedings brings with it risk and cost, so part of the judgement that goes into launching proceedings is whether that is justified in all the circumstances.”
