Our latest insights

Every year, we spend time interviewing our clients to better understand their business and the trends most impacting on them.

Mid-size businesses in Australia tend to be overlooked – they aren’t so big that they generate their own gravitational pull, and aren’t so small that a blip in the economy could result in closed doors.

In a recent article published by Grant Thornton US, it was cited that an estimated 43% of the US workforce (being 60 million people) will be contingent workers by 2020 and Australia shows no sign of diverging from this trend.

For a change, the focus of the recent Royal Commission hearings has been on superannuation and how funds' structures and governance arrangements may lead to poor retirement outcomes for members.

Modern Slavery, in its simplest terms, refers to exploitation of a person for the gain of another person/group and often leaves the person feeling trapped in unethical conditions.

Ben Matthews recently met with the Managing Partner of a mid-tier legal firm to discuss the struggles he was facing in trying to build a successful partnership, including attracting and retaining great people, optimising working capital, maximising tax efficiencies, retiring debt and funding investment.

A recent roundtable we held with some of our clients to discuss the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry highlighted key themes and concerns emerging as a result of the hearings.

In the current tax environment, it is no longer sufficient to have your tax agent sign-off on your annual tax returns. Rather, it is now an expectation that businesses, especially large businesses, have in place proper tax control frameworks to demonstrate that tax risks are identified and managed within the organisation. That is tax governance.

The Federal Government delivered its pre-election Budget in May, and the key winners were older Australians, suppliers to infrastructure projects and small business – just to name a few.

Has your company (or parent company) provided free or discounted shares or rights to receive shares to employees, directors or individual consultants (Employees), or their nominees, during the 2018 income year?

The Australian Tax Office (ATO) issued its latest guidelines dated 25 June 2018 to professional services firms regarding its assessment of risk in respect to allocation of profits within such firms.

Foreign investors have been an easy target for politicians of late. It makes sense – they don’t get a vote and they don’t have a collective voice to defend themselves.