Herd on the Terrace: Helen Lofthouse, David Clarke show sugarcoating way to go on ASX

The tendency of corporate bosses to sugarcoat goes all the way to the top of Australia’s share market. We say this after grappling with ASX Ltd’s responses this week to the Australian Securities and Investment Commission launching a sweeping inquiry into the market operator’s governance and structures. In the fashion of what passes for full and frank disclosure nowadays, newby ASX Ltd chair David Clarke “acknowledged the seriousness” of the inquiry but hailed an “opportunity for independent parties to the review the work underway”. Never mind that ASIC is questioning whether the group is capable of providing secure and resilient market infrastructure after years of problems with technology upgrades, ASX Ltd chief executive Helen Lofthouse made it all sound like a few timing problems. “Our regulators have made it clear publicly that they continue to have confidence,” Lofthouse told a briefing of analysts and media hacks. “We can certainly assume here, at a minimum, that they want to get some verification of that work that we’re doing, and that they’re not satisfied with the pace of change to date.” The only dates the Bull could see in the inquiry terms of reference were to identify technology problems from 2016 to 2024 and to pinpoint a civil prosecution linked to ASX Ltd abandoning its CHESS system upgrade in late 2022. ASIC has accused ASX Ltd of making misleading statements when releasing its half-year earnings on February 10, 2022 — notably that the CHESS upgrade was “progressing well” and remained “on-track for go live” in April 2023. ASIC is trying to contrast these public assurances with alleged private discussions after the CHESS upgrade was given a worrying “red” status in December 2021. ASX Ltd’s Federal Court defence should be a jaw dropper for anyone worried about company announcements sugar coating issues, rather than clearly explaining a problem and potential fixes. The market operator claims it was entitled to rely on assurances from the US chief executive of project contractor Digital Assets on February 8, 2022, that it would provide “prioritisation and resourcing” to the troubled project. We looked forward to a judge ruling on this gem. Budget breakfast hard to stomach Spare a thought for those who rose early Friday to hear Treasurer Rita Saffioti to sell her latest Budget spendathon to a breakfast at Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre. Word is punters were served scrambled eggs and hash browns harder to cut through than Rita the Concreter’s Budget papers. The lights kept going off and on during Saffioti’s speech, prompting her to plead: “Can you see me . . . I can’t see you”. Organisers WA Business News sent an apology email lamenting that the “food and service” fell short of the “high standards you’ve come to expect” from its events. “We sincerely apologise for this and are committed to addressing these issues promptly to ensure we return to the level of our guests deserve,” it said. Alstom goes Dutch on disclosure HOTT operatives also had their digestive resilience tested on Thursday when locked on the top floor of Dumas House with ham sandwiches and embargoed copies of the Budget papers. They endured Rita Saffioti’s attempts to justify ballooning State debt and her observations about the $15 billion Metronet fiscal train wreck. “My lived experience through delivering Metronet was that working with industry, we can secure so many jobs locally if we get transparency in how government purchases,” Saffioti claimed. Almost six years into the State’s contract with rail car importer Alstom, the Dutch company remains unwilling to disclose how much it dishes out on local contracts. Now that’s transparency. Bond credit for Longo switch Australian has more to thank Alan Bond for than winning the America’s Cup and perpetrating a world-class fraud with the $1.2 billion Bell Resources swindle. We should be grateful to Bond for helping turn one-time Parker & Parker commercial litigation lawyer Joe Longo into a corporate crime investigator and ultimately chair of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission. Longo told a (cold, but tasty) breakfast at Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre that his work defending Bond against criminal charges in the early 1990s “opened my eyes to a world I found very interesting”. “I got the opportunity to learn so much and be exposed to very liberated, complex issues,” said Longo. Not only has Longo helped ASIC regrow some teeth since taking charge in 2021, his crew is thankfully tackling some complex issues with its ASX actions, ballooning private markets and potentially-related issues with superannuation.

Herd on the Terrace: Helen Lofthouse, David Clarke show sugarcoating way to go on ASX

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