ACCC boss warns of crypto 'horror scenarios' and lack of competition in Australian aviation

The head of the nation's consumer watchdog is worried that US President Donald Trump's promise to loosen cryptocurrency regulation could lead to more consumers falling victim to investment scams in Australia.
"Any weakening of such regulation is of concern for us," the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) chair Gina Cass-Gottlieb told ABC News.
During his election campaign, Mr Trump promised to turn the United States into the "crypto capital of the planet" and promote wider adoption of other digital assets — which helped push the price of bitcoin as high as $US108,000 earlier this year.
His position is a stark contrast to former president Joe Biden, whose regulators adopted a hardline stance by suing dozens of crypto companies like Binance and Coinbase, for allegedly committing fraud and money laundering offences. Both companies have denied these allegations.
Ms Cass-Gottlieb described the idea of more relaxed crypto regulations as one of her "horror scenarios".
"This is an environment — because of the sophistication of global crime, and also because potentially of regulatory 'freeing up' — that we certainly have an enhanced concern."
The latest figures from the ACCC showed that Australian consumers lost over $1.3 billion to investment scams in 2023. It previously found the majority of such scams involved cryptocurrency — either as a payment method, or subject of a scheme to quickly earn significant amounts of money.
That is why the ACCC is focusing on scams as one of its compliance and enforcement priorities for the 2025-26 financial year.
Competition failure in airline sector
Ms Cass-Gottlieb also said the ACCC will increase its scrutiny of several industries, where a lack of competition is arguably exacerbating Australia's cost of living crisis.
Her organisation has received $30 million in extra funding from the Albanese government, to expand its probes into "unequal bargaining power" from supermarkets to retailers, more broadly.
Others areas of focus for the regulator include essential services (including energy companies and telecommunications firms) and cartels (when companies unlawfully work together to limit competition).
It will also conduct more investigations into "excessive surcharges" and "poorly disclosed additional fees" — from small businesses to large corporations, and named the online booking agent Webjet as an example.
"Late last year, we took action against Webjet ... [for] failure to properly disclose, we allege, the full price, because of the way they represented the minimum price, which actually did not include, we allege, fees that they always charged so that it was not a proper disclosure," she said.
The ACCC boss will deliver a speech to the Committee for Econonomic Development of Australia (CEDA) on Thursday, outlining her enforcement priorities in detail.
"When markets are not workably competitive, Australian customers – whether consumers or businesses – pay the price," Ms Cass-Gottlieb will argue in her speech, while taking aim at the aviation sector, in particular.
"In 2024, the collapse of Bonza airlines and the withdrawal of Rex services from metropolitan routes saw Australia’s domestic aviation industry return to a duopoly – with Qantas and Virgin continuing to control more than 90 per cent of the market," she said.
Rex went into voluntary administration last year, after burning through its cash as it tried to compete with Virgin and Qantas on capital city routes. It is now dependent on government loans for its survival, and only servicing regional routes.
The embattled airline could potentially be acquired by the federal government — if it's unable to find a buyer in the next few months.
"When Rex first offered intercity routes, the ACCC observed a decrease in average airfares."
"Conversely, in the months following the withdrawal of Rex’s major city services last year, average airfares increased.
"A recent report by Treasury into Australia’s domestic aviation sector reveals that the presence of a single additional airline on a route leads to airfares that are 5 to 10 per cent lower.
"When three competitors fly a route airfares halve compared to a route with a single monopoly airline. And with four or five competitors, the price drops further still."
Last year, the ACCC managed to secure a victory against Qantas.
The airline agreed to pay a $100 million civil penalty, after admitting that it sold thousands of tickets for flights that it had already decided to cancel (also known as Qantas' "ghost flights" scandal).
Supermarkets and greenwashing
In November, the ACCC held public inquiries into the supermarkets, and grilled the bosses of Woolworths, Coles, Aldi and Metcash (which owns the IGA brand).
Its preliminary analysis suggests the level of competition in the supermarket industry is "highly concentrated", with Coles and Woolworths accounting for 67 per cent of national supermarket sales.
When sales of Metcash and Aldi are included, that figure rises to 83 per cent.
"We heard of consumers challenged by grocery affordability who were buying less food, skipping meals, and experiencing emotional distress when grocery shopping," according to Ms Cass-Gottlieb's prepared remarks.
The ACCC is expected to submit its final report to the federal government later this year.
Companies which engage in "greenwashing" (or the making of misleading environmental claims) will also come under greater scrutiny.
Ms Cass-Gottlieb 'named and shamed' Clorox, in particular, the manufacturer of GLAD-branded kitchen and garbage bags.
"We have taken actions against Clorox, in relation to GLAD garbage and kitchen tidy bags, which they claimed were 50 per cent ocean plastic, representing that it was ... taking plastics that otherwise would have been or were in the ocean."
Its lawsuit against Clorox is currently before the Federal Court.
'Serial acquirers' and merger reform
Ms Cass-Gottlieb was particularly excited about Australia's new merger laws, which were approved by parliament in November.
The new legislation will take effect from January 2026. It will require companies to notify and convince the ACCC that proposed mergers and acquisitions above a certain monetary threshold won't substantially lessen competition before they can progress with deals.
If companies fail to inform the ACCC about a "notifiable merger", and wait for the regulator to finish reviewing the deal, it could result in the transaction being declared legally void.
The ACCC has argued that under existing laws, there is little it can do to stop it from going ahead — even if it believes a proposed merger or acquisition will harm consumers. It can challenge mergers in court, but only after they happen.
This has allowed some companies to fly under the radar, and to not notify the ACCC of deals.
The consumer watchdog has previously singled out Petstock for completing a spate of pet shop and vet clinic acquisitions that it did not notify the regulator of. It did not find out until much later, when Woolworths sought approval to acquire a majority stake in Petstock.
Qantas has also previously bought a stake in several small airlines without giving the ACCC notification.
"We consider it is one of the most important reforms to help us protect the competition that we have currently in the concentrated markets," she told ABC News, ahead of her CEDA speech.
The ACCC chair also said it will be a "big transition for parties who are serial acquirers ... they'll be engaging with us much more often and much more transparently."