Boosting ASIC’s audit capabilities of AFS licensees may also help improve industry engagement with the regulator in addition to raising standards. It is critically important for the industry to have a strong and open working relationship with the regulator, where balance is achieved between promoting the good, penalising the bad and banning the ugly behaviour. AIST also sees a role for ASIC in the promotion of ‘scaled’ advice, which will allow advisers to give specific, single-issue advice on matters such as superannuation or increasing insurance coverage. We believe scaled advice will improve access to financial advice by making it more cost-effective and affordable. But legislating for scaled advice doesn’t mean it will be taken up by an industry that has tended to focus on providing ‘holistic’ or more comprehensive advice. We believe that it is ASIC’s duty to promote the use of scaled advice. And we believe that the new duty to act in the client’s best interests will play a role in this.
$150 million 4Factor Emerging Markets (EM) equity mandate with Investec Asset Management, $1000, AIST
Opinion
The on- and off-stage antics at the extravagant Milken Global Conference in Los Angeles tell us a lot about where institutional capital is right on the money – and where it is putting its head in the sand. And while the event retains the extraordinary intellectual and financial firepower that has always been its signature, something has shifted. The absences are as instructive as what's on the program.

















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