day in the life of an asic officer

http://www.wealthprofessional.com.au/article/the-punch-day-in-the-life-of-an-asic-officer-129060.aspx
18/05/2012 12:00:00 AM

Dear Diary, it’s already 1 September 2009. It’s the first day of Spring and I’ve been so busy I didn’t even notice the wattles blooming.

Apparently our call centre has been getting a few calls lately; from retail investors, no less. I will have to make a note to speak with our web design people about that. The 1300 number is obviously too easy to find. If we get called into Senate Estimates I’d like to be able to say we’ve had no calls in the five years since AFS was introduced. Life could get a bit inconvenient if the phones start to ring.

A couple of calls have been from oldies with their own super funds, worried about some mob called Trio Capital. Their parents obviously never sent them to Nippers when they were kids. If they have a DIY super fund, they obviously have more money than sense. Don’t they read any of our brilliant publications? Attention all SMSF trustees: you have strayed outside the lifeguard’s patrolled area. Swimming between the flags is safe; once you get outside the flags,sharks may be around.

It’s a great concept isn’t it? Staying between the flags is something all Australian mum and dad investors can relate to. If we scare the pants off as many retirees as possible with the old shark analogy, we’ll never have to verify a managed investment scheme PDS again. Huge amounts of funding will be freed up to build fancy websites and improve the financial literacy of the whole nation, perhaps even the world.

If it’s not the punters trying to talk to us, it’s those audacious financial planners. What a bunch of upstarts they are. What gives them the right to tell the regulator how to do its job? They obviously need some more compliance paperwork to keep them busy.

A strange coincidence came up at our team meeting yesterday. A couple of planners called to say we should be having a look at this Trio mob. One was even a former Treasury employee. I wonder if he’s had an audit recently. We considered giving one of the Trio directors a call, just for a friendly chat, but apparently he’s out of the country.

I suppose we should do something. A cost/benefits analysis should come first. We’ll need to carefully weigh up whether we have the resources to devote to civil or criminal actions, if someone has actually lost any money. Our next meeting with APRA isn’t until early 2010 and we are approaching the silly season. Only eight weeks until the Melbourne Cup, so we need to be careful not to overload our calendars with consultative meetings or we might have to start missing Christmas parties.

I guess I should send someone at APRA an email to see if they’ve had any calls about Trio. Perhaps I’ll have time to compose it after lunch, once I’ve looked over the draft of that new consumer protection booklet we’re working on. Oh, look at the clock. It’s already time for a Chai Latte. Where do the days go?