Compliance & Ethics

Eight years after promising regulators it would fix persistent weaknesses in its anti-money laundering controls, UBS is paying for what those regulators say it failed to finish. Four regulators announced coordinated enforcement actions Monday imposing a combined $173 million in penalties against the firm, concluding that deficiencies identified years earlier continued to undermine transaction monitoring, customer due diligence, and suspicious activity reporting. The actions were brought by the Treasury Department's Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority.

In a 6-3 decision, the court ruled that President Donald Trump lawfully removed Federal Trade Commissioner Rebecca Kelly Slaughter in March 2025 without citing any statutory cause, overturning the core holding of Humphrey's Executor v. United States, the 1935 decision that had long shielded members of independent commissions from at-will dismissal. The ruling dramatically expands presidential authority over agencies that Congress intentionally designed to operate with a degree of independence from the White House.

The Australian Energy Regulator spent much of the past year following the money. It traced overcharges to Centrepay customers, questioned whether vulnerable households had been properly protected, examined how retailers treated customers struggling to pay their bills, and looked closely at what happened when obligations designed to shield people from harm became little more than words on paper.

When Microsoft folded Copilot into its Microsoft 365 subscriptions last year, the change arrived quietly enough. Existing customers on Personal and Family plans suddenly found themselves with new AI features at no extra cost for the remainder of their subscriptions. The real decision came later, when renewal notices began arriving and the free addition became a more expensive default.

The President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) has opened proceedings against Columbus Energy, one of Poland's best-known renewable energy installers, over allegations that the information consumers received before signing a contract, the way the company described their right to withdraw, and the time some customers waited to recover their money after exercising that right.

On Tuesday, the Australian Federal Court ordered Harvey Norman Holdings and Latitude Finance Australia to pay a combined $35.9 million (AUD $55 million) after finding they engaged in misleading conduct and made false or misleading representations in a nationwide advertising campaign that ran between January 2020 and August 2021. Harvey Norman was ordered to pay $22.8 million (AUD $35 million), while Latitude was ordered to pay $13.1 million (AUD $20 million). According to the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC), the combined penalty is among the largest it has secured in a case involving misleading conduct related to financial products and services.

The President of the Office of Competition and Consumer Protection (UOKiK) has opened proceedings against several companies involved in condo hotel developments, alleging they misled consumers about investment returns while failing to explain the costs and risks that could emerge long after the brochures had been put away. The investigations also challenge contract terms that, according to the regulator, deprived owners of meaningful control over properties they had purchased and punished those who tried to exercise it.