Melinda Kee (pictured) is on a mission to find the other victims who moved their superannuation into collapsed funds before it’s too late. (Source: Supplied)
Thousands of Australians are still likely in the dark about losing hundreds of thousands of dollars in their retirement savings. Authorities are still waiting for victims to come forward after more than a $1 billion was quietly lost from superannuation funds of workers across the country.
Social media ads and aggressive sales tactics were used to lure in regular working Australians. That was the case for Queensland woman Claire* who was encouraged to move her superannuation into a new fund and ultimately lost $165,000 when she later learned it had disappeared.
Claire only realised something was wrong when she received a strange email from “equity trustees” which in the moment didn’t mean anything to her at all.
“I was just lucky that I clicked on it,” she told Yahoo Finance.
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Claire, who works in education, admits she isn’t a sophisticated investor. She paid almost no attention to her superannuation but came across an ad while “doomscrolling” Facebook that caught her eye.
“It was along the lines of nine out of 10 super funds are underperforming. Is your’s one of them?” she recalled. “It wasn’t dodgy looking.”
She clicked to find out if her super fund was on the list.
“To get the article you had to put your name and your phone number and your email in, or something like that.”
However when she did, she didn’t get an article. Instead she got a call from a business on the Gold Coast.
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Claire was urged to send through her latest superannuation statement, which she did, and that’s when the “constant” calls started.
Despite her reservations and skepticisms – and repeatedly declining their overtures – the pushy tactics from financial advisors on the other end of the line eventually wore her down and she was convinced to move her superannuation from industry fund QSuper to a fund she couldn’t actually find anything about on Google, called NQ Super.
“They essentially had an answer for everything and made it sound safe as houses, and if I didn’t do this I’m an absolute idiot… They sort of played on my naivety and my lack of knowledge of the super system,” she said.
Claire is one of about 12,000 Aussies who lost an estimated $1.1 billion. (Source: Supplied)
In her late 30s, Claire was promised much higher returns by the time she retired if she switched.
In a subsequent statement of advice put together by an advisory firm called Venture Egg, and seen by Yahoo Finance, she was told the money would be put into mostly standard investments such as the Betashares Nasdaq ETF and Vanguard ETF funds for Australian and international stocks – common, low risk products that track broad sections of the stock market.
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Against her better judgement, she moved her fund over in 2023. But the following year she received a “random” significant event notice in her inbox about an investment fund she’d never heard of.
Claire eventually discovered she had actually been moved into something called the Shield Master Fund which had since collapsed.
Claire is one of about 12,000 Aussies who lost an estimated $1.1 billion when Shield and, later, the First Guardian Master Fund imploded.
“I could have easily just deleted that email – it wasn’t a familiar name to me – but I read it, and I think that’s what the problem is,” Claire said.
A majority of people in those two funds have still not made an official complaint with the appropriate financial ombudsman, with corporate regulator ASIC believing many are still unaware they have been impacted.
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Do you have a story? Nick.whigham@yahooinc.com
Claire, who works in education, admits she isn’t a sophisticated investor. (Source: Supplied)
ASIC sent out correspondence to victims earlier this month, but there are still more than 9,000 people who have not lodged their complaint to receive compensation.
Melinda Kee is another victim and has been working with ASIC as well as the federal government as it works through the ongoing fallout and looks to shore up rules to prevent similar disasters in the future. She runs a Facebook group for victims and has built a website for anyone affected to find vital information about the advisory groups involved.
“I stepped up because it came down to who else was going to? These people are distraught… I’ve had 65-year-old men crying,” she told Yahoo Finance.
She is desperate to reach the thousands of Aussies – some of whom she believes are overseas – who appear unaware that at least some of their retirement savings have been lost.
Melinda has a lot of experience is financial markets and used to be a day trader. She was looking to shift her superannuation savings after the fund she was in at the time had gone backwards by $28,000 over the previous year.
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During a period she was off sick from work, she used iSelect to change a number of bills including, gas, electricity and health and pet insurance. It was shortly after that when she began receiving cold calls about switching her retirement savings as well.
“This wasn’t a case of investors chasing speculative returns outside the system. This happened within the regulated superannuation and financial advice framework, overseen by licensed professionals and trustees with legal fiduciary obligations,” she said.
If you moved your superannuation and think you might be impacted, you can check to see a list of trustees and super platforms that funnelled money into the collapsed funds, which might be more familiar to most victims, and for which deadlines for seeking compensation are fast approaching.
Some victims have only until March 31, 2026, to seek compensation.
ASIC has emailed people they believe unknowingly lost money. (Source: ASIC/Getty)
While some early decisions have been made for a select number of victims who were moved into the collapsed funds, a vast majority, like Claire, are still waiting for their claim to be worked through.
Melinda is advocating for ‘Pay Now Recover Later’ as the government taps the broader superannuation sector to help fund compensation for victims.
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“It is not about rewarding risk-taking, it’s about restoring confidence, fairness, and accountability in a system Australians are required by law to rely on for their retirement,” she said.
This week, ASIC launched a fresh review into the practice of using lead generators to lure in superannuation investors, with more than 40 groups called out.
Lead generation is the process of identifying someone as a potential sales target and may offer a free ‘super health check’ or offer to find your lost super. They are often paid “marketing fees” by licensed financial advisers.
Super Consumers Australia is calling for a ban on lead generation for super and financial advice, along with closing the loophole that allows cold calling to offer financial advice.
The group said predatory super switching schemes had been fuelled by lead generators who had been using social media to collect people’s contact details and sell them on to third parties.
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“These schemes are highly effective, they prey on people who are just looking to do the right thing and get on top of their super,” Super Consumer Australia CEO Xavier O’Halloran said.
*Claire is a pseudonym to protect her identity
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While most AI in financial services remains advisory, LUMIQ has built the layer that owns the decision — autonomous, auditable AI agents making regulated calls in production at leading banks, insurers, and capital markets firms. Today, LUMIQ serves clients across India, the United States, and Southeast Asia — leading institutions across insurance, banking, and capital markets.
NEW YORK and SINGAPORE, June 19, 2026 /PRNewswire/ — LUMIQ, an AI-native financial services company, today announced a strategic funding round to scale auto-decisioning for financial institutions across the United States and Southeast Asia. The round was led by Bajaj Finserv, one of India’s largest and most diversified financial services groups, with participation from existing investor Info Edge Ventures.
LUMIQ raises Strategic Funding to become AI decision layer for financial services
Right now, thousands of customers are waiting for a policy to be issued, a loan to be disbursed, a claim to be adjudicated, because somewhere an FSI employee is drowning in decisions, held back by the risk of getting it wrong. Today, when e-commerce delivers the same day, banks and insurers still decide in weeks. We built LiteCone to take that burden: AI decides the routine cases, completely and accountably, so humans spend their judgment on the one case that actually needs it. This round lets us bring that to every financial institution in the markets that matter most. Shoaib Mohammad, Co-founder and CEO, LUMIQ
From AI that assists to AI that decides
For decades, financial institutions have bought technology that made their people faster — faster data, faster scoring, faster copilots. The decision still landed on a human. LUMIQ is changing that. Through its LiteCone platform, the company deploys AI agents that read the file, apply the institution’s own guidelines, and reach the decision end to end — escalating only the cases that genuinely require human judgment. The output is not a recommendation. It is a decision, with full reasoning attached, cross-referenced to policy, and defensible under audit.
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The results in production speak clearly. At a leading life insurer, LUMIQ’s LEO agent decides 75–80% of underwriting cases with zero human touch, reduced policy issuance cost by roughly 25%, and compressed turnaround from days to under eight minutes — running 24×7 with complete auditability. Across its client base spanning insurance, banking, and capital markets in India, the US, and Southeast Asia, LUMIQ now processes millions of decisions annually.
LiteCone turns a real financial-services role into a working AI agent in weeks. Every agent we deploy is consistent, explainable, compliant, and auditable by design — not as an afterthought. This capital lets us go deeper on the platform and broader across roles. And through our cloud and AI lab partnerships, institutions will increasingly find LiteCone already embedded in the platforms they run today. Vaibhav Dobriyal, Co-founder and Chief Product Officer, LUMIQ
This round funds four priorities: expanding go-to-market in the US and Southeast Asia; deepening LiteCone’s decisioning capabilities; extending the agent workforce across more financial-services roles; and building a partnership ecosystem with cloud hyperscalers, AI labs, and core banking and insurance platforms so LiteCone is embedded where institutions already run.
LUMIQ’s investors backed the round for the same reason its customers adopt LiteCone: agents already deciding in production, with auditability and control built in.
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As a financial-services group, we know how much rests on getting regulated decisions right, at speed and at scale. LUMIQ has built AI agents that decide in production with auditability and control built in, the capability the industry has been moving toward. We are proud to lead this round and to support the team’s expansion across the US and Southeast Asia. Lakshmi Iyer, Group President – Investments & CEO, Bajaj Alternates
Our conviction is grounded in what LUMIQ has already built. Their AI agents aren’t just built for the future. They are operating in production today, at speed. This combination is rare, and its value will only compound as the company scales globally. Girish Jhunjhunwala, Fund Manager – PE and VC Investments, Bajaj Alternates
Financial services is one of the hardest categories to crack — regulated, risk-averse, and unforgiving of hype. LUMIQ has put agentic AI into live financial-services workflows and earned the trust of large institutions across the US, Southeast Asia and India. That is how a category-defining company in financial-services AI gets built, and we are proud to keep backing the team as they scale globally. Kitty Agarwal, Partner, Info Edge Ventures
LUMIQ’s goal is to lead one category: auto-decisioning at production scale for financial services. Agents that act, not assist, and never compromise audit, compliance, or predictability.
About LUMIQ LUMIQ is an AI-native financial services company. Through its LiteCone platform and a growing workforce of production AI agents, LUMIQ turns real financial-services roles — insurance underwriter, credit underwriter, claims adjudicator — into agents that are consistent, explainable, compliant, and auditable. The company pairs deep domain expertise across banking, insurance, and capital markets with frontier AI. LUMIQ employs over 350 AI and data specialists, and has offices in New Jersey, Singapore, and Delhi NCR (India).
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Web: www.lumiq.ai
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View original content:https://www.prnewswire.com/apac/news-releases/lumiq-raises-strategic-funding-to-become-the-ai-decision-layer-for-financial-services-302805280.html
Consumer confidence has plunged among traditionally optimistic younger adults amid fears for their personal finances and the wider economy, figures show.
GfK’s long-running Consumer Confidence Index remained unchanged at an overall score of minus 23 in June.
However, the analyst said this was was “misleading as, beneath the surface, there are new signs that confidence is weakening”.
Source: GfK
Neil Bellamy, consumer insights director at GfK, said: “The biggest fall this month is among those aged 16 to 29, traditionally one of the most optimistic groups.
“Here confidence has dropped 11 points over the past month to minus two, the lowest level seen for two years, driven by large falls in views on both their own personal finances and the wider economy.
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“More broadly, there are now no demographic groups with a positive confidence score, including higher-income households earning £50,000 or more, who have slipped back into negative territory as of June.
“Confidence remains subdued and vulnerable to further economic or political uncertainty.”
Sourve: GfK
Overall, confidence in personal finances over the coming year remained flat at minus two, four points lower than this time last year.
The measures of both personal finances and the economy over the previous 12 months were both slightly down, by two points and three points respectively, “reflecting the sense that things have been extremely tough over the last year for so many”, GfK said.
The only measure to increase was expectations for the wider economy over the next 12 months, up two points to minus 36 but still eight points below this time last year.
The major purchase index, an indicator of confidence in buying big ticket items, remained at minus 20, four points lower than June last year.
“Ships of the World, start your engines. Let the oil flow!” said Donald Trump on social media after he announced the signing of an interim peace deal with Iran on Sunday. Under the agreement – which Iran acknowledged included a 60-day negotiating period for a final deal – the president said that following retrieval of mines, there would be a “toll free opening” of the Strait of Hormuz.
But many of the finer details remain “unclear”, said The Guardian. There are questions over the “exact timing of the reopening of the maritime route, who will oversee safe passage and whether any conditions will be applied”.
Financial markets have welcomed the announcement, but further volatility could yet hit people’s pockets.
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Have oil prices changed?
The price of oil fell to about $83 (£62) per barrel following Sunday’s announcement, its “lowest since the early days of the war”. Then on Tuesday it dipped below $80. In February, before the first missiles struck Iran, each barrel cost around $73. The price peaked at around $120 at the height of the conflict.
Prices are expected to fall in the wake of a prolonged ceasefire, and there are “real grounds for optimism”, said Politico. Damage to oil-specific infrastructure has been “limited”, meaning it could take “as little as six weeks to resume outflows”.
“So that’s the energy crisis sorted, right?” Not so fast.” A combination of damage to wider infrastructure and the continued closure of the Strait of Hormuz has meant roughly 12 million fewer barrels of oil have been produced each day. And they “won’t magically reappear on the market even if the pact holds”.
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Will this continue?
The “first big test” of the deal will be whether shipping companies will have enough “confidence” to return the use of the strait to pre-war levels, said The New York Times. If successful, this will free the 250 tankers and 330 cargo ships trapped in the Gulf, according to the BBC, and transport oil around the world. Oil and gas producers in the Gulf nations would then need to re-establish “wells, refineries and other infrastructure”.
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Even if all of that were to materialise, European and Asian countries who have historically depended on oil from the region “will face a long wait”. Processing oil takes considerable time. “It is unlikely that the prices of gasoline, diesel and other fuels will return to pre-war levels anytime soon.”
What about inflation?
Despite air fares “surging” and fuel costs “tipping higher”, UK inflation remained at 2.8% in May, said The Independent. This was a “surprise” to economists, who had widely predicted a rise to 3% and “perhaps even beyond” due in part to the war in Iran.
Remaining at this level could imply that the “cost-of-living squeeze will not play out as badly as had been anticipated” earlier this year, even if the “Iran war sent energy costs spiralling”. However, prices are set to rise again later in 2026, leaving savers to make sure their investments are earning an interest rate “well above the rate of inflation”.
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What does this mean for consumers?
Food prices in the UK look to be rising more slowly. Should the Strait of Hormuz open freely, fertiliser, which has “soared in costs” and put pressure on farmers, could fall substantially, said the BBC. Jet fuel has already seen a “small fall in price”, with Northwest Europe jet fuel trading at $1,033 (£780) per tonne, compared with $831 pre-conflict and around $1,840 at its peak.
How will businesses be affected?
Beneath the “encouraging headlines” about inflation control, there is a “hidden crisis for businesses”, said The Telegraph. The Iran war triggered one of the largest energy shocks in history, meaning businesses were “swallowing soaring costs to spare shoppers”.
“Input rises” for producers climbed by “8.7% year on year in May”, larger than the 7.9% in April and the highest in more than three years. On the bright side, this means the economy may avoid a dreaded “wage-price spiral”, but conversely lower margins could lead to increased pressure on the employment market.
