Overview
- ASX CEO Anthony Attia has publicly pushed to explore bringing Australia from two-business-day (T+2) to next-day (T+1) cash equity settlement and said he will consult regulators and market participants on the idea.
- Attia said the T+1 decision could be separated from ASX’s CHESS replacement timetable so the change does not have to wait for the system’s final upgrade, which remains scheduled for 2029.
- ASX’s push follows a period of outages, upgrade delays and cost overruns that prompted a nine-month inquiry, an A$150 million capital requirement from ASIC and a separate A$20.5 million penalty for misleading statements.
- Global moves increase pressure on ASX because the United States moved to T+1 in 2024 and major European exchanges and Hong Kong are targeting one-day settlement in 2027, which could affect Australia’s competitiveness.
- Faster settlement could cut the time firms are exposed to counterparty and market risk and force brokers, clearing houses and registries to change processes and systems, a shift Attia frames as key to rebuilding ASX’s reputation.