Macquarie Securities Australia Admits Short-Sale Misreporting; ASIC Seeks A$35 Million Penalty

Macquarie Securities (Australia) Limited (MSAL) has admitted to misleading conduct related to the misreporting of short sales over multiple years, following repeated failures in its systems and processes.

The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) and MSAL will jointly ask the Supreme Court of New South Wales to impose a penalty of A$35 million, along with other orders. Any penalty and orders remain subject to court approval.

In agreed facts filed with the court, MSAL acknowledged it failed to correctly report at least 73 million short sales between 11 December 2009 and 14 February 2024. ASIC estimates the total number of misreported short sales ranged between 298 million and 1.5 billion.

The firm said the inaccurate reporting resulted from multiple systems-related failures, many of which went undetected for more than a decade.

MSAL also admitted to deficiencies in its supervisory policies and procedures, organisational and technical resources, and risk management systems. The firm failed to ensure compliance with its short-sale reporting obligations. In addition, it acknowledged incorrectly reporting regulatory data for more than 633,000 market orders between 16 November 2022 and 21 March 2023.

ASIC said the action forms part of its broader efforts to address misconduct and regulatory compliance failures among major Australian financial institutions.

ASIC commenced civil proceedings against MSAL on 14 May 2025. The case marks the regulator’s first enforcement action focused on short-sale reporting.