Australia announced late February that it would be ‘tagging’ all securities which are lent from October this year and would be introducing new reporting requirements on both lenders and borrowers from the end of the calendar year.

Leigh Watson, regional general manager and head of NAB Custodian Services, who chaired the session, asked each panellist to predict whether the Australian Securities and Investments Commission would lift the ban on shorting financial services stocks a few days later. Each correctly predicted that the ban would remain.