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Australia: Homeland company cleared of mortgage price fixing

By  |  August 5, 2015

The full bench of the Federal Court of Australia has dismissed an appeal by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission regarding price fixing allegations involving ANZ home loans.

The court proceedings concerned allegations in 2004 by the ACCC that ANZ had entered a price-fixing agreement with Mortgage Refunds Pty Ltd to limit the refund it could provide to its customers when arranging ANZ home loans.

The consumer watchdog alleged that ANZ made and gave effect to an agreement where it would only allow Mortgage Refunds to continue to be accredited to offer ANZ mortgage products if it agreed to limit any refund it paid to its customers to $600. This would have allowed ANZ branches to match the deal if they chose to waive the bank’s loan establishment fee.

Full content: The Adviser

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