Australia’s Licensing Regimes for Financial Services, Credit and Superannuation: Three Tracks Toward the Twin Peaks

Licensing regimes form an integral part of Australia’s Twin Peaks system of financial regulation. This article surveys three of the different licensing regimes that were particularly relevant to the Financial Services Royal Commission: the Australian Financial Services Licence (AFSL); the Australian Credit Licence (ACL); and the Registrable Superannuation Entity (RSE). Taking into account the recent changes to regulation of superannuation in the Financial Sector Reform (Hayne Royal Commission Response) Act 2020 (Cth), the article analyses the structure and content of these three regimes, and their broader regulatory context, to determine whether there is scope to consolidate, rationalise, and harmonise these licensing regimes. From that survey, the article concludes that there is scope for rationalisation of the AFSL and ACL regimes, but that the RSE licensing regime should continue to be separate.