The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has commenced court action against Equity Trustees Superannuation Limited in regards to its decision to allow members to invest in the First Guardian Master Fund.
The corporate regulator commenced civil penalty proceedings in the Federal Court alleging failures in care, skill and diligence in making that decision, adding to a similar action commenced in August 2025 against Equity Trustees in regards to allowing investments in the Shield Master Fund.
ASIC stated more than $65 million was invested in three classes of First Guardian between June 2023 and March 2024 by around 2700 members of NQ Super and Pension, a division of the AMG Superannuation Fund for which Equity Trustees was the trustee.
It has alleged that prior to onboarding First Guardian, Equity Trustees did not obtain critical information such as the constitution, audited financial accounts or audit of its compliance plan from the investment fund.
Additionally, it allowed its members to invest 100 per cent of their funds in First Guardian despite evidence it was or may have been illiquid.
As such, ASIC alleged Equity Trustees failed to exercise the same degree of care, skill and diligence as a prudent superannuation trustee would in onboarding the different classes of First Guardian, failed to act in the best financial interests of members when performing its duties and exercising its powers in relation to First Guardian, and failed to do all things necessary to ensure the financial services covered by its Australian financial services licence were provided efficiently, honestly and fairly.
As a result of these actions, the regulator is seeking compensation for members for losses resulting from the alleged failures, as well as declarations and civil penalties.
ASIC deputy chair Sarah Court said the action was part of an enforcement program examining the collapse of First Guardian and related funds, and is the fifth court action against a superannuation trustee as part of its First Guardian and Shield Master Fund investigations.
“We allege that a prudent superannuation trustee in Equity Trustees’ position would not have approved the First Guardian classes as investment options based on the information it had available,” Court said.
“Superannuation trustees play a critical role helping their members save for retirement, but we allege Equity Trustees failed to put the interests of their members first.
“ASIC has now commenced proceedings against every super trustee that made available Shield or First Guardian. More than $420 million has been repaid to thousands of investors through ASIC’s work to date.
“We currently have more than 26 matters under investigation or before the Federal Court and we expect further action to follow.”
Jason Spits
SENIOR JOURNALIST
Jason is a senior journalist with Benchmark Media and writes for the selfmanagedsuper website and magazine and smstrusteenews website. He has covered financial services since 1999 and has written about life insurance, superannuation, investment management and financial advice, in both a freelance and in-house capacity, and also did a brief stint as a media manager for an industry association. He has been the editor of trade titles Money Management and Financial Standard, and was most recently senior journalist with life insurance title Riskinfo.
Articles by Jason