Tony has expertise and experience in consumer credit and retail banking law, payment systems regulation, personal property securities laws, anti-money laundering legislation and privacy legislation. Tony’s capabilities include the development and distribution of regulated financial products, both under consumer credit legislation and the financial services provisions of the Corporations Act; advising on significant retail banking related transactions (including co-branded arrangements and loyalty schemes); advising on electronic banking and payment systems; advising on the regulatory and licensing requirements to establish and operate financial institutions in Australia; and liaising with various regulatory bodies, including APRA, ASIC, AUSTRAC and the ACCC.

Tony also regularly advises and represents clients in alliances, joint ventures, business process re-engineering, outsourcing and procurement of services by financial institutions especially in the retail banking and payment systems sectors.
 
For three and a half years (2000 – 2003) Tony was a senior executive and chief legal officer of a US software company supplying the financial services sector. He spent two of those years in the Silicon Valley.

His typical assignments include:

• advising on design of legal documentation, systems, procedures and compliance in the provision of banking, financial and consumer services
• preparing contracts for implementation of new business processes
• representing clients in establishing alliance, joint venture and distribution arrangements
• negotiating contracts for both suppliers and customers for information technology transactions including software licensing, development and support arrangements, hardware procurement, communications services and for supply of related services such as backup and disaster recovery services.

Examples of transactions and matters in which Tony has been involved are as follows:

• Retail credit advice, documentation and transactions for a wide range of clients. This legal work has included issues under the Personal Property Securities Act, National Consumer Credit Protection Act, National Credit Code (and the UCCC), the Australian Consumer Law (including equivalent provisions of the ASIC Act), EFT Code of Conduct, Banking Code of Conduct, Privacy Law and Policy, and related legislation such as that regulating discrimination in the supply of services
• a review and redesign of documents and processes of a major trading bank for the purposes of the Personal Property Securities Act
• Assisting issuers of credit cards to establish a loyalty program or to negotiate with providers of rewards programs 
• Advising offerors of credit and debit cards in negotiations with payment systems providers
• Preparing both margin lending and securities lending documentation for an Australian bank (in connection with the recent regulation of margin lending products under the Corporations Act)
• Advising a margin lending institution on compliance with the margin lending requirements of the Corporations Act
• Advising on the establishment, compliance and funding needs of a niche financier in the strata sector
• Representing a major retailer in its negotiations with potential general purpose credit card partners, which included documenting the deal that was eventually struck with a card issuing financial institution
• Representing a big four bank in the negotiation of its transitional services arrangements in relation to the acquisition of another financial institution
• Advising a bank on the unwinding of its relationship with the provider of a rewards program that was attached to a substantial credit card portfolio
• Working with various financial institutions to ensure that fees and charges for a range of financial products are properly disclosed and do not infringe any legal requirements
• Advising an insurance company on the re-negotiation of certain outsourcing arrangements and the transition to a new supplier
• Representing a federal government agency in the negotiation of the terms of a large scale technology procurement
• Advising a funds manager on a number of contracts for supply of risk management tools, analytical tools, facilities management and disaster recovery services
• Advising a university on the procurement of software to be designed to meet specific regulatory requirements
• Advising a listed software products company on the acquisition of another software products business, and on the terms of supply of solutions to customers in the financial services industry
• Representing an investment bank in a technology outsourcing of its dealing room systems needs
• Advising a market data supplier on transactions relating to its distribution business for market data and financial information, and software development and licensing
• Participating as a member of a committee of internal and external counsel formed to undertake a review and standardizing of global terms of supply of services by the market data supplier
• Advising parties engaged in establishing the proposed National Electronic Conveyancing System
• Participating in a team that advised a big four bank in a strategic alliance with a retailer to supply banking services through supermarket checkouts
• Advising a payments system provider on the legal issues and documentation for establishing its stored value card offering in Australia, and more generally on documentation needs of its cards division in Australia.

• a contributor to the LexisNexis Australian Consumer Credit Law Service;
• a contributing author of the LexisNexis service entitled the Personal Property Securities in Australia; and
• a member of a number of relevant industry bodies including the Financial Services Committee of the Business Law Section of the Law Council of Australia.

Tony has a Bachelor of Laws from the University of Auckland and a Master of Laws from the University of New South Wales. He is admitted in New Zealand, NSW, Victoria and several other Australian states. He was first admitted in NSW and Victoria in 1983.