We previously reported on the Federal Court decision of Aussiegolfa v FTC here and here. The Full Federal Court has now handed down its appeal decision. This case is an important because it considers two key planks of the superannuation prudential standards, the in-house asset rules and the sole purpose test. This snippet looks at the former, another snippet looks at the latter.

The legislation to pass the government’s proposed amnesty for super guarantee has failed to pass the senate in the June 2018 sittings.

The ATO has released SMSF News Alert 2018/3 under which it acknowledges a defect in the transfer balance cap regime which can cause the debit on the commutation of a market linked pension (or life expectancy pension) to equal nil.  

The Government has released a bill that provides a “one off” 12 month amnesty to encourage employers to self-correct historical super guarantee non-compliance.

The Government has released a bill to “add back” limited recourse borrowing arrangement (LRBA) loans in the calculation of a member’s total superannuation balance (TSB).

The Government has released a bill to extend the application of the non-arm’s length income (NALI) rules to income and capital gains gained or produced under arrangements involving non-arm’s length expenditure. The genesis of this measure was non-commercial limited recourse borrowing arrangement (LRBA) loans but the proposed legislation applies to all arrangements where there is non-arm’s length expenditure or costs and also to arrangements where assets are acquired for under market value consideration.

As hoped, the Federal Government’s 2018 Budget did not contain too many changes in relation to superannuation and what changes were announced were generally positive.

The Government has announced a proposal to increase the maximum number of members that a self managed superannuation fund (SMSF) can have from 4 to 6.  

The ATO has effectively ruled, from 1 July 2017, that SMSFs can no longer create most types of reserves or have “unexplained increases” in pre-1 July 2017 reserves.

In a recent speech, James O’Halloran, Duty Commissioner Superannuation at the ATO, set out the ATO’s current areas of focus for the self managed superannuation fund (SMSF) sector. This includes that the ATO:

The recent decision of Aussiegolfa v FCT is an important decision for considering two aspects of the superannuation laws that are not often considered by the Courts, the in-house asset rules and the sole purpose test. This snippet looks at the former, another snippet looks at the latter.

The recent decision of Aussiegolfa v FCT is an important decision for considering two aspects of the superannuation laws that are not often considered by the Courts, the in-house asset rules and the sole purpose test. This snippet looks at the latter, another snippet looks at the former.

The Australian Securities & Investments Commission (ASIC) has released a media release putting the financial advice sector on notice about ensuring that binding death benefit nominations (BDBNs) are signed and witnessed correctly.

The ATO has announced the extension of the lodgment date for self managed superannuation (SMSF) annual returns for the 2016/17 year to 30 June 2018. Because 30 June 2018 falls on a Saturday, the ATO has confirmed the lodgment can occur on Monday 2 July 2018 without penalties.  

The ATO has released a media release confirming its final position on its new event based reporting regime to be known as the transfer balance account report or “TBAR”.

This month Phil Broderick of Sladen Legal presented at The Second Annual Property Taxation Symposium Television Education Network on New Issues with Owning Real Property in an SMSF.

Further to our previous snippets on the ATO’s new transfer balance report (TBAR) regime (see here and here), the ATO has announced that it will consult on two alternative options for the TBAR regime.

As reported in our previous Sladen Snippet, the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) is currently developing a new self managed superannuation fund (SMSF) event based reporting regime to be called the Transfer Balance Account Report or TBAR.

Self managed superannuation funds (SMSFs) are not required to obtain an actuarial certificate if 100% of the SMSF is in “pension phase” for 100% of the year. That is, the SMSF uses the segregated method for the whole year. But what happens for SMSFs that use the segregated method for the 2017 year but, because of the transfer balance cap measure, have to commute back their pensions to $1.6 million by 30 June 2017?

The Treasury Laws Amendment (2017 Measures No. 2) Bill 2017 has been tabled in Parliament. The Bill proposes to make two important changes to transition to retirement income streams (TRISs). Firstly, to allow certain TRISs to qualify for “retirement phase” and, secondly, to ensure TRISs qualify for the cost base reset.