Fiducian subsidiary to pay $7.3m penalty

Mike Taylor

Managing Editor and Publisher

31 March 2026

Fiducian Group Limited has agreed to pay a penalty of $7.3 million over its superannuation subsidiary Fiducian Investment Management Services Limited (FIMS) initiating court action over ESG claims.

Fiducian announced to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) late on Monday that it had entered into a heads of agreement with ASIC to resolve the proceedings initiated by the regulator last year.

Under the heads of agreement:

• FIMS agrees to pay to the Commonwealth a pecuniary penalty of $7,300,000.
• FIMS agrees to pay ASIC’s legal costs of its investigation and legal proceedings agreed at an amount not to exceed $650,000.
• The parties consent to the making of declarations by the Court to the effect that:
  • during the Contravention Period, the Product Disclosure Statements published by FIMS in respect of the Diversified Social Aspirations Fund (DSAF) contained ESG Statements and Systems and Processes Statements which were liable to mislead the public as to the nature and/or the characteristics of financial services, in contravention of s 12DF(1) of the ASIC Act; and
  • FIMS, in its capacity as the responsible entity of the DSAF, contravened s 601FC(1)(b) of the Corporations Act by failing to discharge its duties to act with the care and diligence that a reasonable person would exercise if they were a Responsible Entity in FIMS’s position in relation to the DSAF of the matters pleaded at paragraphs 128(a), (b)(i) to (v) and (vii) and (c)], [129(a) to (e), (g) and (h)(i) to (iv)] and [130] (with the cross-reference in [130(a)] amended so as to omit [129(f) and (h)(v))) of the Statement of Claim).
• The parties will agree a statement of agreed facts and admissions.

A date for the finalisation of the proceedings will be set by the NSW Supreme Court.