InvestorDaily

InvestorDaily

ABC

The Reserve Bank has cut its official interest rate by 0.25 percentage points to a new record low of 1.25 per cent. While it is the first change in the RBA’s policy setting since August 2016, it was a widely expected result. The RBA governor Philip Lowe effectively flagged a rate cut in a speech last month.

The futures market had priced in a 100 per cent likelihood of a cut at the June meeting, with another cut expected by October. All 43 economists surveyed by Refinitiv had also pencilled in a rate cut this month, while 80 per cent of them also expect a follow-up move in August. The RBA has been under mounting pressure to stimulate a clearly faltering domestic economy, with retail sales figures out this morning showing consumers had cut back their spending.

The rest of this article can be found at abc.net.au.

InvestorDaily

A good culture of compliance within wealth management businesses must start with why certain regulatory measures are being implemented in the first place, according to a panel of compliance experts. Speaking exclusively on the InvestorDaily webcast yesterday, Advice Compliance Support managing director Nikolas Kloufetos said that staff they need to understand why they’re undertaking compliance measures, noting it’s not enough for staff to simply be aware of them. “For example, you’ve got 10 documents and need to make sure [a certain] sentence is on all of them. Well, why are you doing that?” he said.

“If you start off with that premise then you might actually end up with a more concise document by removing stuff that may not need to be there. That’s just one example – maybe some kind of training, not necessarily on how you do it, but why you do it, and what the impact is across the organisation and on the customer.” Mayflower Consulting founder and chief executive Sarah Penn noted that, in an organisation with a good compliance culture, the customer has to be at the heart of what people do. However, she added that organisations also need to think about the current customer in the future, and not just in the present.

The rest of this article can be found at investordaily.com.au.

SMH

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has personally urged the nation’s biggest banks to pass on all of an expected 0.25 percentage point cut in official interest rates on Tuesday as the Reserve Bank of Australia seeks to drive unemployment down towards 4 per cent. The RBA is tipped to take the cash rate to a new record low of 1.25 per cent following its monthly board meeting in what will be the first loosening of monetary policy since August 2016. A quarter percentage point cut in mortgage lending rates would save someone with a $400,000, 30-year mortgage $67 a month in repayments if it was passed on in full.

Mr Frydenberg, who met with Commonwealth Bank chief executive Matt Comyn on Monday after similar meetings with other major bank CEOs in recent days, has personally made the case that they should pass on all of any cut in official rates from the current 1.5 per cent. “I expect all banks to pass on the benefits of sustained reductions in funding costs,” he said. Markets and economists are expecting the cut in interest rates after RBA governor Philip Lowe used a major address last month to argue the country had to “do better” than the current jobless rate of 5.2 per cent.

The rest of this article can be found at smh.com.au.

InvestorDaily