As trustee of your SMSF, you’re responsible for investing your fund’s assets and monitoring the performance of those assets.Investing via your superannuation fund is markedly different from investing outside of super, because you must follow your fund’s trust deed, follow your super fund’s investment strategy, and ... Read more
Drafting your SMSF investment strategy: A Super Guide
Every super fund, including every self-managed super fund, is legally required to have an investment strategy. An investment strategy identifies financial goals (investment objectives) for the fund, and helps determine each fund member’s tolerance for risk and the investment time horizon for each member.Although ... Read more
SMSF record-keeping and reporting: A Super Guide
Note: SMSF record-keeping checklists appear at the end of this article.Although record-keeping and reporting may not seem like the main game when running a self-managed super fund, recording and reporting on trustee decisions, investment transactions and member contributions is fundamental to the proper operation ... Read more
SMSF compliance for super beginners
Your responsibilities as a self-managed super fund (SMSF) trustee are directly linked to superannuation law, tax law, corporations law or trust law. Generally, SMSF trustees must consider at least 9 super compliance must-dos.If you run an SMSF, you must follow the super laws and tax laws in particular, or risk ... Read more
SMSFs for beginners: What is an SMSF, and how does it work?
In the past, SMSFs were more commonly known as DIY super funds. Historically, self-managed super funds have been popular with business owners and other self-employed individualsWith the introduction of compulsory super, and a growing awareness of the importance of saving for a long life in retirement, SMSFs have ... Read more
SMSFs: Driving your super C-A-R-T obligations
If you run an SMSF (or you’re considering running an SMSF), a helpful way to understand your responsibilities as an SMSF trustee, is to consider that operating an SMSF is all about steering your own super CART.CART is a term that I have coined to help SMSF trustees manage the mandatory aspects of running an SMSF, ... Read more
SMSF investment: Franked dividends to lose some shine
The Liberal government is reducing the company tax rate to 25% for smaller companies (annual turnover of less than $50 million) by July 2026, and which is already law. The federal government is also proposing to reduce the company tax rate to 25% for all companies currently paying 30%, including large listed companies ... Read more
SMSF trustee personality test: What type are you?
A SMSF study released in 2017 charts the dynamic SMSF sector, and sets out to investigate the “motivations, attitudes and decision-making behaviours” of SMSF trustees. The SMSF Report (2017), jointly produced by the SMSF Association and the Commonwealth Bank (and conducted by ACA Research), is structured around 4 SMSF ... Read more
SMSF confidential: the inside story on DIY super funds
Note: The ATO publishes an annual report about SMSFs for each financial year. This article covers the ATO’s 2015-2016 statistical review of SMSFs (released in January 2018). This report also contains data for the 2016-2017 year. The annual report for the 2016-2017 year will be available in January 2019.The ... Read more
SMSFs: ATO supervisory levy must be paid in advance
The ATO supervisory levy payable by SMSFs each year has been increasing in leaps and bounds over the past few years. The levy payable each year now sits at $259 and this amount is payable in advance. For a new SMSF what this means is that you would pay double the SMSF levy in your first year.For the 2017/2018 year, ... Read more
Oops! Top 10 SMSF boo-boos
Note: Every year, the ATO publishes the top compliance mistakes made by SMSF trustees. This article contains data up to 30 June 2017 (latest available as at January 2018). The next update, for compliance data up to 30 June 2018, will be available in January 2019.The ATO has published the top 10 compliance mistakes ... Read more
SMSFs: Enough super to justify SMSF running costs?
Note: This article analyses the cost-effectiveness of SMSFs for small, medium or large fund balances, examining both set-up costs and running costs. For further information on the latest SMSF costs see SuperGuide article links at the end of this article. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) ... Read more
