COMMENT | It was a simple flip - buy the company that owned the property, then resell it for a quick profit and distribute the ill-gotten profits. It would have been a win-win situation where every party involved smiles all the way to the bank.

It was a simple yet ingenious way of quick money and preventing the taxman from collecting property gains tax.

But then, in Australia, one does not get away with such things, especially when they come to the attention of award-winning investigative journalist Nick McKenzie.

In 2012, we investigated payments to Malaysian intermediaries to secure a contract for Securency, a subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of Australia, to print currency notes for Bank Negara.

Subsequently, a former employee of a Reserve Bank subsidiary who disguised the payment of almost AU$80,000 to a Malaysian businessperson as “marketing expenses” has been spared jail after a Victorian judge found management had in fact made the decision.