The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has taken action against 28 SMSF auditors in the first half of the 2026 financial year and removed the ability for the majority of them to act in that role.
The corporate regulator stated that between 1 July 2025 and 31 December 2025 it had disqualified four SMSF auditors, cancelled the registrations of 22 practitioners and imposed additional conditions on two other auditors.
ASIC added it took these actions after it found breaches of professional obligations and standards, including failing to comply with auditing and assurance standards and independence and continuing professional development requirements, failing to advise ASIC of changes to their contact details on the public register of SMSF auditors and not responding to regulatory compliance requests, and failing to carry out enough audit work to meet the practical experience requirements.
The four auditors disqualified were Andy Choi, Andrew Orphanides, Robert Morey and Ermis Yianni.
ASIC stated Orphanides and Yianni were disqualified as they continued to audit SMSFs whose financial statements were prepared by staff in their own firm, which is counter to the APES 110 Code of Ethics, and despite the regulator previously imposing extra conditions on their SMSF auditor registration to address this issue.
Morey and Yianni requested ASIC reconsider its disqualification decision, but the regulator confirmed both disqualifications. Both Morey and Yianni have since applied to the Administrative Review Tribunal for a review of their respective outcomes.
ASIC stated nine of the 22 auditors who had their registrations cancelled – Yvonne Ching, Patrick Hoey, Christopher Leech, Rochelle Massih, Barry Mendel, Rick Siew, Thien Siow, John Whiting and Weifeng Zhu – had failed to perform any significant audit work during the past five years.
They were referred to ASIC by the ATO as part of its project to identify auditors who fail to maintain the necessary practical experience, while Ahmed Afifi and Fredel Twum had their registrations cancelled for not updating their contact details on the public register and failing to respond to regulatory compliance requests.
The registrations of 11 SMSF auditors were cancelled for failing to comply with their obligation to lodge multiple annual statements and John Couroyannis and Dawid Maj had additional conditions imposed on their SMSF auditor registrations.