Sterling no Ponzi scheme says ASIC
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Whatever the Sterling Income Trust was, it was not a Ponzi scheme, according to the chairman of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), Joe Longo.
Giving evidence before the Senate Economics Committee inquiry into the collapse of Sterling, Longo said that he had had a lot of experience with Ponzi schemes over the years but “this is not a Ponzi scheme”.
“It is a very distressing, catastrophic failure of a managed investment scheme that has hurt a lot of people that is what it is,” the ASIC chairman told West Australian Senator, Louise Pratt. “But it is not a Ponzi scheme.”
In doing so, the ASIC chairman admitted that the regulator was still trying to get to the bottom of how the scheme worked.
Earlier, Longo acknowledged that while ASIC had received complaints about Sterling in around 2016/17 it had not acted until being contacted by West Australian authorities around almost two years’ later.
He said that the initial complaints had not triggered any concern because ASIC had had “no visibility” of the tenancy side of the Sterling equation because it came under State Government regulatory jurisdiction.
The ASIC chairman said that he was satisfied that the judgements which had been made by ASIC were reasonable in the circumstances, but noted that it was now to be determined whether matters have a criminal nature had occurred capable of warranting the attention fo the Commonwealth Director of Public Prosecutions.
Will APRA be meeting the super fund executives to discuss this matter over dinner, followed by drinks at a nearby…
So, given the vast majority of Australians bank with one of only four retail banks, which BTW represent nthe greatest…
Me to
Why do I get the feeling this will drag on and on for years and go in a big circle…
Perhaps if Jayaweera got himself a job within Treasury helping them persecute thousands of innocent advisers, he would have escaped…