THE CRYPTO BRIEF

ASIC 2023 Enforcement Priorities

The Australian Securities and Investment Commission has announced its Enforcement Priorities for 2023, which will include action on greenwashing and predatory lending.

ASIC Deputy Chair Sarah Court announced the priorities at the ASIC Annual Forum in Sydney, highlighting the need to protect consumers from financial harm and misleading conduct ,and uphold the integrity of Australia’s financial markets. The 2023 priorities include:

• Misleading conduct in relation to sustainable finance including greenwashing

• Misconduct involving high risk products including crypto assets

• Combating and disrupting investment scams

• Protecting financially vulnerable consumers

With the increasing demand for financial products that are environmentally friendly, sustainable and have good corporate governance, generally referred to as ESG investments, comes the risk of greenwashing.

Greenwashing, as the term for the practice of misrepresenting the extent to which a financial or investment product or investment strategy meets environmental, sustainable or ethical targets. ASIC are monitoring for misleading conduct and will take enforcement where claims of greenwashing that cannot be sustained.

In the two years to June 2022, ASIC received over 2,200 reports of misconduct regarding crypto-assets or crypto scams. Accordingly, an enforcement priority going forward will be protecting Australians from investment scams and high-risk investment products, including crypto assets.

The Australian Securites and Investment Commission is a wholly owned government authority. It should not be confused with the similar initialism crypto-miners use Application Specific Integrated Circuits or ASICS. ASICS are purpose-built chips, to mine cryptocurrency, which are claimed to make cryptomining more powerful and more energy efficient.