CANBERRA, Feb. 27 (Xinhua) -- Australia's consumer watchdog has issued a warning to companies engaging in misconduct, saying new penalties could cause share prices to fall.
Rod Sims, chairman of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC), said that new consumer laws introduced in 2018 could see courts fines companies more than 100 million Australian dollars.
He said that the substantial fines would force investors and directors to take notice, saying that companies saw fines of up to 10 million Australian dollars as "loose change."
"We need penalties that mean that when the penalty is announced, the share price takes a dip. At the moment, the share price doesn't take a dip, it doesn't get affected at all," Sims said.
The new laws allow courts to impose fines of 10 million Australian dollars or 10 percent of annual turnover depending on which is greater.
"I am not for a second saying there is anyone on the company board that wants to break the law," Sims said in a speech to the Committee for Economic Development of Australia on Tuesday night.
"The question is how much does it matter to them to make sure they don't, because the incentives are all the other way. We have to make it matter enough.
"I am not someone who is here to talk about corporate culture. I am someone who is going to talk about punishment that will move the culture. We are into punishment."
Sims set out his agenda for 2019, saying that advertising services on digital media platforms were in the ACCC's sights.
He was also critical of Australia's courts, which he said were making it difficult to prove that consumers would be worse-off as a result of corporate mergers.
"We are increasingly concerned that the bar for establishing a likely substantial lessening of competition is being raised to a height that is failing to protect competition and ultimately consumers," Sims said.
"The law prohibits mergers and agreements likely to substantially lessen competition.
"These prohibitions are there to protect the competitive process in our markets.
"It is important that they can be effectively enforced."
