The Federal Court of Australia has ordered Macquarie Bank Limited to pay a fine of $10 million for failing to put in place effective controls to prevent and detect unauthorised fee transactions by third parties on customers' cash management accounts using Macquarie's batch trading tools.

Macquarie allowed its clients to grant third parties (such as financial advisors, stockbrokers, and accountants) varying levels of authority to transact on their accounts, including limited authority to withdraw fees from third parties. Not only that, but the bank also provides third parties with a bulk trading tool that allows multiple withdrawals to be made on multiple client accounts at the same time.

Between 1 May 2016 and 15 January 2020, Macquarie failed to implement effective controls to monitor whether the third party's bulk transactions under the fee authorisation were actually used to collect fees.

Although Macquarie initially defended the action, it later admitted breaching its duty to provide efficient, honest and fair financial services to its clients.

The final outcome indicated that Macquarie agreed to pay a $10 million penalty.