I would suggest that anyone who thinks this sort of onerous clause is limited to the Opes way of doing business, have a look at Part 5 of the Commsec margin lending agreement which you can download from their website.
In the normal course of events, commsec margin lending clients hold shares in their own name in a chess account with commsec. Commsec has power of attorney to make operations on those shares.
However, according to Part 5 of their agreement, commsec can, at any time, transfer title to the shares to their own nominee account, for the purpose of enhancing their security. In fact any investments which are not chess ( for example managed funds ) are held this way.
So any client of commsec, and I would think any other legit margin lending company, has already agreed in advance that their broker/lender can transfer the title of the shares into their own nominee account, at any future time that the broker wants to. For example, they could then engage in stock lending outwards, if they want to.
Not suggesting that commsec, or any other broker/lender, is setting out to rip off their clients. Not at all. The point I am making, is almost any arrangement you enter into contains these sort of potentially objectionable clauses, and there is not much people can do about it.
