Silos
Australia first, then the rest.
A silo goes live when it has verified local feeds, a compliance rule set checked against that country's regime, and something worth reading. Empty silos are worse than absent ones, so the planned ones stay unlinked until they are none of those.
Latest
AUMonetary policy27 Aug 2026
Three cuts, then three hikes, then a hold with a raised eyebrow. The problem is not that the RBA changed its mind. It is that it keeps announcing what it thinks before it knows.
Position
The RBA's error in 2025-26 was not the direction of policy but the confidence of its communication, which broadcasts conviction at a resolution its data cannot support.
Wrong if
If the Board holds through December while inflation drifts back toward the band without further tightening, the reversal was simply the facts changing and the guidance was doing its job.
AUTax26 Aug 2026
Division 296 went live on 1 July. Industry won the fight over unrealised gains. The carve-out nobody argued about is the one that quietly splits the system in two.
Position
The cost-base grandfathering election in Division 296 is available to self-managed funds but not to members of large pooled funds, which turns an administrative constraint into a tax outcome.
Wrong if
If self-managed fund establishments and large-balance rollovers do not lift through FY27, the differential was too small to move behaviour and the equity objection was academic.
XBComparative25 Aug 2026
Four countries looked at the same asset class and reached for different instruments. The choice of instrument, not the severity, is what determined where the industry ended up.
Compares Australia, United States, India, United Kingdom
Position
Regulators that reached first for licensing shaped their domestic industry, while those that reached first for enforcement or tax mostly relocated it, and that difference follows from the instrument rather than from how strict each country was.
Wrong if
If domestic platform counts and onshore trading volumes converge across these four countries over the next three years despite the different instruments, the instrument mattered less than the underlying market and this reading is wrong.
AUFintech24 Aug 2026
Australia now licenses crypto platforms under the ordinary financial services regime. The interesting question is not whether that was right, but what happens to the ninety per cent of platforms that were never registered.
Position
Folding digital asset platforms into the existing AFSL regime rather than building a bespoke one was the right call, but the transition will consolidate the sector far more than the policy debate acknowledged.
Wrong if
If the number of licensed platforms operating in Australia at commencement is close to the number operating today, the consolidation concern was overstated and the transition worked.
AUPayments22 Aug 2026
Digital wallets, buy-now-pay-later and stablecoin rails all sit inside the central bank's perimeter as of December. That is a larger shift than the digital asset legislation that got the headlines.
Position
Expanding the definitions of payment system and participant hands the RBA authority over the parts of retail payments that actually grew, and the designation power matters more than any rule yet made under it.
Wrong if
If no significant platform is designated within two years of commencement, the power was symbolic and the reform changed less than its scope suggested.