APRA

APRA has issued Vanguard a superannuation licence as it prepares to launch a disruptive play for Australia’s gargantuan retirement savings pool.

The Albanese Government has begun to explore the potential negative impacts of super fund consolidation. The question is whether a super fund can ever be too big to fail.

“We believe in our story,” says Julie Lander. The CareSuper CEO chats to Greg Bright about mergers, diseconomies and spending money.

“The industry should not be happy to simply sit somewhere in the middle… Increased transparency will drive increased analysis and action. If you can’t measure it, you can’t improve it.”

The performance test as it stands isn’t “fit for purpose” when it comes to choice products. And its bright line nature means tweaks are needed for MySuper products too.

A new report from CEM Benchmarking shows that the Your Future Your Super (YFYS) performance test lifts system-wide outcomes. But size of fund is no silver bullet.

The regulator says it doesn’t “blindly adopt” a big is good, small is bad approach, and is concerned the industry is consolidating too quickly.

Mercer Super Trust’s merger with Westpac’s superannuation assets will prepare the retail fund for a new era of competition in Australia’s rapidly consolidating super sector.

Life isn’t always easy at the small end of town, but the $5 billion legalsuper is kicking against APRA’s orthodoxy that bigger is nearly always better.

Australia’s super funds are racing to achieve massive size in the understanding that it will create untold benefits for members. But “a little but of circumspection and caution” is required. “People seem to be taking it as a fact that you just need to be bigger, and that it’s obvious you need to be bigger…