Helping a business raise money, and where AML/CTF touches it
A company needs capital, so it sells shares or borrows. If you act on that raise, you are providing a designated service — and this item starts earlier than the others.
Start here
What this service is
A business needs money it does not have. There are two ways to get it: sell a piece of the business to an investor, or borrow. Equity, or debt.
Item 4 catches the work of making that happen. Drafting the subscription documents, preparing the loan agreement, running the shareholder resolutions, putting the term sheet together.
It reaches financing for a company or a trust that already exists — and, expressly, for a proposed one. The entity does not have to exist yet.
| The everyday version | |
|---|---|
| Equity financing | A company issues shares to raise money — a capital raising, a seed round, a rights issue |
| Debt financing | A company borrows — a facility agreement, a loan note, convertible debt |
| For a body corporate | An existing company, or one that does not exist yet |
| For a legal arrangement | A trust or similar structure raising money, existing or proposed |
The only item in Table 6 that uses it — preparatory steps can be caught
Raising shares and raising borrowings are both within the item
A “proposed body corporate” is expressly included
Financing work became a designated service under Table 6, item 4
The word that makes this item different
“Organising” pulls the start line earlier
Most items in Table 6 speak of assisting in the planning or execution of a transaction. Item 4 adds a third word: organising. It is the only item that does.
The effect is that preparatory work can be inside the service. Drafting a term sheet on instructions is organising a financing, even though no money has moved and no investor has signed.
The line still holds at general advice. Talking a founder through whether debt or equity suits them, with nothing being organised, is not caught. The test AUSTRAC applies elsewhere applies here too: does the work advance the financing, or only influence whether it happens?
Their own example of influence is a credit rating obtained for the company. It may well decide whether the raise succeeds, and it still does not advance it.
Are you providing it?
Financing work, sorted
| The work | Caught? |
|---|---|
| Preparing loan or subscription documentation for a company raising debt or equity | Caught |
| Acting on a capital raising — shareholder resolutions, investor documents | Caught |
| Drafting a term sheet on instructions | Caught — a preparatory step that directly advances the financing |
| General advice about financing options, where nothing is being organised or planned | Not caught |
| Obtaining a credit rating for the company | Not caught — that influences whether financing proceeds without advancing it |
What actually gets checked
Six checks on the person who engaged you
Item 4 names one customer. You are not required to run customer due diligence on every investor in the round — but where money is arriving from people nobody can account for, that is a matter for your own risk assessment and, if it comes to it, your reporting obligations.
| The check | What is required | How it is usually done | What stays in the file |
|---|---|---|---|
| Identify the customer | Full name, date of birth and residential address of the person who engaged you | Licence or passport, in person or by digital check | What was collected and how it was verified |
| Look through the entity | If your client is a company or trust, who owns or controls it | ASIC extract, share register, trust deed | Who they are and the document relied on |
| Screen for PEPs and sanctions | Whether your client is politically exposed, and a check against the DFAT Consolidated List | A screening tool, or a manual DFAT search | The result and its date |
| Understand the purpose | What the money is being raised for, and from whom | The information memorandum or term sheet usually answers it | A note where the picture is unclear |
| Rate the risk | Assess and record the ML/TF risk of the customer | Your program’s risk factors — offshore investors and opaque lenders raise it | The rating and the reasons |
| Keep watching | Monitor for as long as the engagement lasts | Raises run for months and investors change | What you reviewed, when, and what you concluded |
Records are kept for 7 years.
The provision itself
Table 6, item 4, in the Act’s own words
“assisting a person in organising, planning or executing a transaction, or otherwise acting for or on behalf of a person in a transaction, for equity or debt financing relating to: (a) a body corporate (or proposed body corporate); or (b) a legal arrangement (or proposed legal arrangement); in the course of carrying on a business”
Customer: the person. Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006 (Cth), s 6(5B) table 6, item 4 — Compilation No. 62 (C2026C00274).
Compare the opening with item 2. Item 2 says “planning or execution”. Item 4 says “organising, planning or executing”. One word, and it moves the start line.
The thirteen designated services
One article for each service you can select when you enrol
13 of 13 written so far. The rest are in progress.
- ConveyancingEvery step of a settlement, and how CDD differs from the VOI you already do.Table 6, item 1
- Selling a businessWhen a company or trust changes hands.Table 6, item 2
- Client moneyHolding or controlling someone else’s money or property in a transaction.Table 6, item 3
- Equity and debt financingyou are hereRaising money for a company or legal arrangement.Table 6, item 4
- Shelf companiesSelling or transferring a company created to be sold.Table 6, item 5
- Company and trust formationCreating or restructuring a company, trust or partnership.Table 6, item 6
- Director and trustee rolesActing as, or finding someone to act as, a director, trustee or attorney.Table 6, item 7
- Nominee shareholdersHolding shares in your name for somebody else.Table 6, item 8
- Registered officeLetting a client use your address as their registered office.Table 6, item 9
- Real estate agentsThe agent’s customer is both sides of the deal — and the two sides start at different moments.Table 5, item 1
- Property developersSelling your own stock with no agent in between, and why that changes who the customer is.Table 5, item 2
- BullionGold, silver, platinum and palladium, and the $5,000 exemption.Table 2, item 1
- Jewellers and dealersWhy the $10,000 line is about how the customer pays, not what they buy.Table 2, item 2
Sources
Where every figure here comes from
Data as at 27 September 2026.
- Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act 2006, s 6(5B) table 6 · Federal Register of Legislation · Compilation No. 62 (C2026C00274)Item 4 and its customer definition, quoted verbatim on this page.
- Professional designated services · AUSTRAC · Guidance, current at Sep 2026That preparatory steps are caught where they directly advance the financing, and the credit-rating example of something that does not.
- Australia M&A Outlook 2026 · PwC Australia · Published 2026, covering 2025Context on Australian deal and financing activity.
Before you rely on this
This content is general information only. It is not legal, financial or compliance advice. Organisations should check AUSTRAC guidance, legislation, their own AML/CTF Program and professional advice where needed.
- Where preparatory work crosses from advice into organising is a judgement on the facts. Record the reasoning, not just the conclusion.
- Financing work carries obligations under the Corporations Act and financial services law that this page does not address.
- Current as at 27 September 2026.
Lex-AML supports compliance workflows and record keeping. It does not provide legal advice, does not guarantee compliance, and does not replace professional judgement or advice from a qualified AML/CTF adviser or legal professional.
GetPost Labs is a technology company. We are not a law firm and not a compliance adviser, and this page is not a substitute for either.
We build Lex-AML. To build it properly we had to understand these obligations the way the people carrying them do, so we researched them with small and medium practices across the affected sectors — how the work actually runs, where the law lands inside it, and which questions were hardest to get a straight answer to. Publishing what we found is how we check that we have understood a requirement before we build for it.
That understanding is also what we bring to a conversation. No two practices run a matter the same way, and tooling that assumes one way of working fits almost nobody. We would rather start from how you already work — your intake, your file, your sign-off, the software you already pay for — and shape the compliance work around that than hand you a process and ask you to adopt it.
So this is an offer of capability, not a pitch. If Lex-AML turns out to fit your practice, we would like to work on it with you. If it does not, what is written on this page stands on its own, and every source it rests on is listed above so you can check it yourself.