The big four Australian bank “betrayed” customers in a slew of institutional and retail failures, Australia’s securities regulator has said.
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The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) on Monday said it has agreed penalties totalling A$240 million (US$160 million) with Australia and New Zealand Bank (ANZ) for “unconscionable” non-financial misconduct. ASIC and ANZ have jointly submitted the proposed penalties to the Federal Court for consideration after the Melbourne-based lender admitted all alleged wrongdoing.
Its failures, stretching back to at least 2013, include deceptive handling of a government bond deal which ASIC says could have left Australian taxpayers out of pocket, mishandling customer hardship notices and deceased estates, and misleading customers over interest rates.
The record penalties, the highest ASIC has ever imposed on a single entity, mean the regulator has proposed and ordered fines totalling more than A$310 million (US$207 million) against ANZ across 11 civil penalty proceedings since 2016.
“Time and time again ANZ betrayed the trust of Australians,” ASIC chair Joe Longo said in announcing the penalties, which comprise A$125 million (US$83.4 million) for institutional and market matters and A$115 million (US$76.8 million) for retail matters. “There are fundamental issues with ANZ’s risk and compliance culture that require the board’s and executives’ urgent attention.”
“While we have worked hard to get regulatory certainty on these matters, the reality is we made mistakes that have had a significant impact on customers,” ANZ chair Paul O’Sullivan said in a statement. “On behalf of ANZ, I apologise and assure our customers we have taken the necessary action, including holding relevant executives accountable.”
While managing a A$14 billion (US$9.3 billion) bond issuance for the government in April 2023, which the bank inflated its trading turnover to secure, ANZ sold a significant volume of Australian bond futures around the time of pricing instead of limiting market impact by trading gradually throughout the day, placing downward price pressure on the bond price.
Nearly 65,000 customers were affected by incorrect reporting of bond trading data which overstated the volume by tens of billions of dollars; ASIC said ANZ’s reports afterwards were misleading or deceptive.
ASIC has not alleged the bank engaged in market manipulation and ANZ said it does not believe its actions caused losses to public funds in its capacity as duration manager.
The bank separately failed to respond to almost 500 customer hardship notices relating to unemployment, medical issues and bereavement between May 2022 and September 2024, taking more than two years to respond in some cases while continuing to attempt to recover debts. It has since completed a remediation programme, reimbursing customers over A$90,000 (US$60,000) in total so far and corrected customer credit reports.
Between July 2019 and June 2023, ANZ also failed to refund fees charged to deceased customers due to inadequate systems and processes. It then failed to respond to bereaved persons and representatives of the deceased estates. While some A$3.8 million (US$2.5 million) has been returned and over 9,000 apologies issued, ASIC said the extent of impact remains unclear.
Advertised bonus interest for new accounts between July 2013 and January 2024 was not always applied by the bank, which the regulator said was misleading. Separately, ANZ promoted base variable and bonus fixed introductory interest rates for certain accounts between August 2024 and March 2025 – rates ASIC said were inaccurate. The bank has signalled its intent to remediate affected customers.
“If these penalties are imposed by the court, it will be a clear message to ANZ and all other banks that the cost of breaking the law is not an acceptable cost of doing business,” deputy chair Sarah Court said.