On 2 June 2026, Aro hosted a practical webinar on the upcoming AML/CTF Tranche 2 changes with AML advisor Kate Camilleri. The session covered why this is happening, what the new regulatory requirements mean in practice, how to build your compliance program using AUSTRAC’s Starter Kit, and a few situations worth seeing coming before July 2026.
We received 38 questions on the day. Below are the answers to every relevant question raised – grouped by topic to make them easier to find. Business broker questions have their own section at the bottom.
In This Post
1. AUSTRAC Registration
2. Customer Due Diligence (CDD) - Buyers and Sellers
Assess what you can reasonably observe and record it as you go. Pass any red flags to your compliance officer. Where contact genuinely is too thin to form any view, a buyer who will not meet, will not provide information, or instructs entirely through someone else – that absence is itself one of the risk signals, not a gap you need to account for.
Assess what you can reasonably observe and record it as you go. Pass any red flags to your compliance officer. Where contact genuinely is too thin to form any view, a buyer who will not meet, will not provide information, or instructs entirely through someone else – that absence is itself one of the risk signals, not a gap you need to account for.
Using the same system as the solicitor can make sharing information easier, but being on a shared platform does not by itself create a reliance arrangement. Reliance can also be established outside a shared platform – the Starter Kit does not require a common system for it.
3. Auctions
4. Contracts and Timing
You may be able to delay completing it on the other party – where the conditions for delayed CDD are met – up to 28 days after exchange of contracts, or at least three days before settlement, whichever is earlier. This is the delay provision in the legislation, not a general grace period.
If you are still brokering sales after 30 June, you remain a reporting entity with the same obligations. Those obligations do not pass to the solicitor. The solicitor has their own obligations for the services they provide, and you do not take those on.
The only thing that would change your AML position is if you stop providing the designated service itself – that is, stop brokering sales. If your trust account is changing because your business structure is changing, it is worth confirming with an adviser whether you are still providing a designated service.
5. Overseas Buyers and Funds
What it does flag are specific factors that often come up in cross-border deals: a buyer connected to a high-risk country, funds coming from overseas with no clear connection to the buyer, a foreign politically exposed person (PEP), or an offshore or shell company structure that makes it difficult to identify who is really behind the purchase.
A foreign resident buying normally, from a low-risk country, with explainable funds is not automatically high-risk – though verifying their identity may take more work. Where the deal touches a high-risk country, a foreign PEP, or an offshore structure, that triggers enhanced due diligence. It is not the passport that matters – it is the combination of where the money is from, what country it is connected to, and whether the structure makes it hard to see who is behind the deal.
The questions to ask: does the country the funds came from make sense for this buyer? Is it a high-risk jurisdiction? Does the origin of the money match what they have told you? If it all adds up, record it and proceed. If it does not – funds from somewhere with no link to the buyer, or from a high-risk country – that is when you complete the deeper check or escalate. The overseas transfer is not the problem; an unexplained overseas transfer is.
6. Risk Assessment and Source of Funds
That means more than just asking. The Starter Kit‘s process is to collect documents or other forms of evidence that you can use to verify the information provided on reasonable grounds. For a business sale, that might include a signed letter from a certified practising accountant confirming the source, or a copy of the sale record.
The standard is “on reasonable grounds” – you are satisfying yourself with reliable, independent evidence. If the information is unclear or from an unusual source, ask for more. You can explain this is required under your AML/CTF obligations. Record what you checked, and the deal proceeds.
7. Technology, Tools and Integrations
8. General Compliance Questions
9. Business Brokers
A: If there is no real estate in your deals, first consider whether you are caught at all – or whether you may be caught by a different designated service. Assisting someone to sell, buy or transfer a body corporate or legal arrangement may apply to business sales structured as share or entity transfers, but not always.
Many business sales are structured as asset sales rather than transfers of the entity itself. Asset sales may not be a designated service at all. Depending on how your deals are structured, you may or may not be captured.
It would be advisable to confirm your position with an AML adviser or lawyer first. Relevant AUSTRAC links: Check if you need to enrol and Designated services for newly regulated entities.
A: This depends on which of your services are captured and how they are classified. Once you have confirmed which designated services apply to your business, choose a Starter Kit that matches. Many providers cater for multiple designated service types. Confirm your position with an AML adviser or lawyer before proceeding. Refer to the AUSTRAC links in the answer above.
A: Yes – if the broker is brokering the sale, purchase and transfer of real estate. See the answer above for further detail on how designated services apply to business brokers specifically.
Watch the full session
The webinar replay is available now. Covers what Tranche 2 means in practice, how to build your compliance program, and the situations worth seeing coming before July 2026.