Australia's ASX Ltd may be forced to spin off its lucrative clearing and settlement business following a review of the nation's financial systems sparked by Singapore Exchange's bid for the bourse operator, analysts and fund managers say. Such a move, could also make a foreign takeover of ASX more acceptable to the Australian government. Canberra formally rejected the $8 billion SGX bid on Friday, partly due to concerns about control of those key financial systems being handed to a foreign company. [ID:nL3E7F73WZ]. Australian Treasurer Wayne Swan said that the regulatory framework of the financial systme would be reviewed after the ruling.
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