Regulatory Radar

Auditors, reporting entities, standard setters and advisers with an interest in the governance of Australia's financial and sustainability reporting standards may wish to review the exposure draft to understand how the three new standard setting boards will operate once External Reporting Australia is established on 1 December 2026. Entities preparing for upcoming sustainability reporting obligations in particular may want to monitor how the sustainability standards board's governance and procedures are finalised, given this body will have carriage of that standard setting function going forward. Submissions could be made before the consultation closes on 15 October 2026 if governance arrangements would affect stakeholder input into future standards.

For companies and audit committees, the key distinction is between eligibility for a statutory audit exemption and the separate expectations of investors, lenders or contractual counterparties. Even where statutory relief is available, a financing or shareholder agreement may still require audited financial information. The instrument does not automatically vary those contractual promises.

For finance teams, directors and advisers, the practical relevance is identifying the exact relief used in preparing, presenting or lodging a report. An entity’s structure, reporting status and the particular reporting period may affect eligibility. A general statement that ASIC has remade reporting relief is not enough to establish that a company or scheme qualifies.

Firms employing or engaging registered tax or BAS agents could review internal supervision, escalation and quality assurance arrangements in light of the Board's expanded sanction toolkit, given that conduct previously addressed informally may now attract a broader range of formal regulatory responses. It may be worth confirming that compliance manuals and professional conduct policies reflect the updated regulatory regime, and that registered agents within the business understand the circumstances in which the Board could now act. Groups with an in-house tax function may also wish to consider whether existing professional indemnity arrangements remain appropriate given the broader sanctions now available to the Board.

Conveyancers, property lawyers and transaction teams handling settlements involving a foreign resident vendor could check settlement checklists and withholding calculation templates against the categories addressed in this instrument, particularly for transactions involving multiple vendors, deceased estates, income tax exempt entities, relationship breakdowns or mortgagee sales. Since the instrument repeals and replaces several earlier variation instruments, practitioners relying on precedent documents referencing the superseded instruments could update those references. M&A teams handling asset acquisitions from foreign resident vendors may also want to confirm the correct variation applies before finalising withholding amounts at settlement.

Businesses that use standard form consumer contracts containing arbitration, mediation or other dispute resolution clauses, particularly in financial services, may wish to review how those clauses are presented and whether customers are given clear information about their effect on access to court and to class actions. Relevant considerations include whether the clause is reasonably necessary to protect legitimate business interests and whether its practical cost makes individual claims uneconomic. A review of standard terms against the factors discussed in this decision could help assess exposure under the unfair contract terms regime, though each contract and factual matrix will differ.

Finance and reporting teams at superannuation funds and not-for-profit public sector entities may wish to confirm which commencement date applies to their organisation, since the operating cash flow reconciliation changes to AASB 1039 and AASB 1054 take effect for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027, a year ahead of the broader AASB 18 and AASB 107 relief that applies from 1 January 2028. Entities considering early adoption should check whether doing so affects comparatives or disclosures in the current reporting cycle.

Motor vehicle manufacturers and importers supplying passenger or light goods vehicles in Australia may wish to review their current repair information access offers, including pricing structures, equipment requirements and the range of access periods provided, against the reasonable commercial terms and fair market price requirements of the Motor Vehicle Service and Repair Information Sharing Scheme. Given the ACCC has now acted against several manufacturers over similar issues, compliant systems and pricing are worth confirming before a vehicle range reaches the Australian market, rather than after repairer complaints prompt an investigation.

Listed company secretaries and boards relying on the exemption from separate director notification under section 205G should confirm their internal director interest notice templates and checklists refer to the current instrument number, 2026/758, once it takes effect. Because the exemption depends on the company already having complied with applicable listing rules covering the same notifiable interest, companies may wish to confirm their listing rule disclosure processes remain aligned with the exemption's conditions. No substantive change to disclosure obligations is indicated by the remake itself.

Businesses with in-house tax agents or that engage external tax and BAS agents could review supervision and quality-control arrangements given the Board's broadened suspension, penalty and infringement notice powers. Transaction teams working on mergers that may be notifiable under the Competition and Consumer Act may wish to understand the shift from automatic voidness to voidability for unnotified acquisitions, and how the revised associate and stale notification rules could affect deal timetables and completion mechanics. Groups with a tax advisory arm should consider briefing relevant staff on the increased exposure to civil and criminal consequences for misconduct, and confirm reporting lines remain adequate under the strengthened regime.

Businesses with material exposure to domestic air travel or freight costs, including those negotiating corporate travel arrangements or logistics contracts, may wish to note the ACCC's continued interest in airfare movements, capacity reductions and fuel cost pass-through when assessing future pricing and contract terms with airlines. Given the current monitoring direction applies until December 2026, it would also be worth watching whether the government extends or adjusts that direction, since any change could affect the frequency and detail of future ACCC reporting on domestic airline pricing and competition.

For real estate agencies, the practical contract questions include whether current listing commitments reflect the changes and how any downgrade flexibility operates within the applicable advertising package. Minimum listing requirements, tier commitments and variation provisions may influence both cost and the ability to use alternative services. The undertaking does not itself describe every agency’s individual contract or establish a universal right to end an agreement without consequence.

Companies that currently claim the Research and Development Tax Incentive, and their tax advisers, could begin modelling how the proposed changes to the core and supporting activity distinction, the intensity premium threshold, the refundable offset age limit and the expenditure thresholds would affect their claims if the exposure draft proceeds largely unchanged. Businesses with long R&D project cycles or that rely on the refundable offset beyond ten years of operation may wish to consider making a submission before the consultation closes, given industry bodies have already raised concerns about those specific elements. As the measure is proposed to commence from 1 July 2028, there is time to plan, but early engagement may help shape the final design.

Parties involved in contested control transactions, and their advisers, could note that the three month or one month statutory period in which the Takeovers Panel must decide whether to declare unacceptable circumstances is not absolute, and that the Federal Court may extend it under section 657B where there is good reason and the panel's own process requires more time. Boards and shareholders involved in a live Panel application may wish to factor the possibility of such an extension into their expectations about timing. Businesses should also be aware that courts may order confidentiality over sensitive evidence filed in support of a Panel-related application, which can affect what becomes publicly visible during the proceeding.

Venues, broadcasters, retailers and other businesses that play music in the course of their operations can continue to obtain licences through APRA's existing collective licensing model, which remains authorised until 3 October 2031. Businesses with concerns about licence fees, royalty distribution or transparency in APRA's arrangements may wish to engage with the consultation and review processes that APRA is now required to maintain under the revised conditions, including use of the alternative dispute resolution scheme where a specific dispute arises.

Businesses that regularly receive or may receive ACCC compulsory notices, including those with directors, officers or registered addresses overseas, may wish to review how the firm or the business currently accepts and logs service of such notices, so that any change to permitted service methods can be incorporated once the amendment is finalised. It may also be worth confirming internally who is authorised to accept service on behalf of the business, since greater flexibility in service methods could mean documents are validly served through channels not currently monitored.

Retailers selling online may wish to review customer-facing communications, including template emails used to respond to refund or exchange requests, to check they do not suggest that consumer guarantee remedies are discretionary, limited to store credit, or conditional on goods being unopened or unused. It may also be worth confirming that any warranty against defects published on the website contains the wording the Australian Consumer Law requires, making clear that the warranty operates in addition to, and does not limit, a consumer's statutory rights.

Not for profit clients and charity boards could be alerted that a Treasury consultation is underway that may lead to the ACNC disclosing more information about deregistrations and finalised investigations than it currently does. Governance committees may wish to consider how any future public disclosure of investigation outcomes could affect reputational risk management and existing communications protocols. Advisers to the sector could also track the consultation outcome before finalising governance policies that assume investigation findings remain confidential once a matter concludes.

Businesses considering acquisitions in markets with a strong local or regional presence, such as car dealership networks, may want to assess overlap at the level of the specific area in which both parties operate, rather than only at a national or state level, since that is where the ACCC's competition concern arose in this matter. Where an acquisition could increase concentration in a particular locality, it may be worth considering early whether a structural remedy, such as divestment of overlapping sites, could address the ACCC's concerns and support a faster clearance.

Providers of subscription based data products may wish to review subscriber terms, access monitoring controls and audit trails that could evidence unauthorised access to a competitor's service, since this proceeding turns on allegations of inducing subscribers to breach terms and copying competitor data. Businesses engaged in similar disputes should also note that admissions made during a hearing are not necessarily final, and that evidence of a pattern of conduct across multiple instances can be admitted as tendency evidence where it is relevant to proving inducement or unauthorised copying allegations.