Our latest insights

With all that had been going on as 2020 closed out, it would have been easy to miss the introduction of a new reporting obligation placed on certain entities from 2021 forward.

In this podcast, Grant Thornton Risk Consulting partner Katherine Shamai discusses what it means to be a good corporate citizen, how COVID has moved the conversation along, and the long term risks to brand and stakeholders of getting it wrong.

Following the recent Parliamentary Inquiry into class actions and public debate around regulatory settings during COVID-19, Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has announced his intention to legislate permanent reform to continuous disclosure laws.

According to National Head of Retail & Consumer Products, Luke Ritchie, The explosion in online retail has been underlined by pureplay online businesses acquiring failing bricks-and-mortar retailers at bargain basement prices, only to relaunch them as online only operations.

M&A took a massive hit in 2020, with the majority of transactions put on hold in the February-March 2020 period in response to COVID.

Good news for everyone looking to grow their superannuation balance. The ATO has announced that from 1 July 2021 the transfer balance cap (TBC) will be indexed from $1.6m to $1.7m.

The preliminary December 2020 retail figures from the ABS underline just how resilient the Australian retail sector has been throughout 2020.

Summary of 2020 Local technical and financial reporting alerts

The ATO recently amended GSTR 2004/4 Assignment of payment streams including under a typical securitisation arrangement (GSTR 2004/4) to clarify how the ATO permits GST recovery for a home loan originator.

As flagged in June this year, Federal Parliament has passed a comprehensive package of reforms to Australia’s foreign investment review framework and Foreign Acquisitions and Takeovers Act 1975 (FATA), due to come into effect on 1 January 2021.

On 1 January 2021, a new simplified small business restructuring process will become available for small businesses.

Commencing in 2021, the Federal Government has announced a new, simplified small business restructuring process for small businesses as part of the economic relief reforms.