Agribusiness MIS Failures: Policy Lessons from the Quintis Failure

Abstract

Major failures of forestry agribusiness managed investment schemes (MIS) in 2010 created significant losses for retail investors and prompted several parliamentary inquiries. Not all recommendations by those inquiries have been implemented, although many have been subsumed into policy changes stemming from the Australian Financial System Inquiry. This article argues that reforms proposed and those implemented do not go far enough to resolve inherent problems with the agribusiness MIS model. The article uses the 2018 failure of Quintis Ltd, a large ASX company and responsible entity for 17 MIS schemes, to assess the remaining gaps in tax and regulatory policy for forestry agribusiness activit..