The Australian Securities & Investments Commission has filed four sets of proceedings in the Federal Court and will seek penalties totalling AUD 240 million after ANZ Bank admitted to contraventions in a Commonwealth bond transaction and widespread retail misconduct. The matters span unconscionable and misleading conduct, failures to act efficiently, honestly and fairly, and customer harm affecting nearly 65,000 customers. One proceeding concerns ANZ’s role in helping deliver an AUD 14 billion Australian government bond deal, where ASIC alleges the bank sold a significant volume of 10-year Australian bond futures around pricing, placing undue downward pressure on the bond price and potentially leaving the Commonwealth about AUD 26 million worse off, while also misreporting bond trading data to the Australian Office of Financial Management by tens of billions of dollars over nearly two years. The other proceedings cover delayed responses to hundreds of financial hardship notices, misleading bonus interest promotions that led to underpayment of tens of thousands of savings customers over a decade, and failures in deceased estate handling including not refunding fees charged to thousands of deceased customers and slow responses to families. ASIC is asking the court to approve a proposed AUD 80 million penalty for the unconscionable conduct component, and said its investigation did not find evidence of breaches of the market manipulation provisions of the Corporations Act. The penalties remain subject to Federal Court approval, and ASIC indicated it will closely monitor ANZ’s follow-through on remediation and non-financial risk management over the next year or two.

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