Horrible year for bankers . . . and it’s not over yet
And another one gone and another one gone, another one bites the dust . . . What a time to be an Australasian bank boss, eh?
So much scandal, so many sudden departures, what is going on?
Last week, Westpac chief executive Brian Hartzer resigned and chairman Lindsay Maxted announced an early and imminent departure.
This follows revelations the bank failed to adequately monitor and prevent transactions that ran foul of anti-moneylaundering and counter-terror laws — and may have included child trafficking.
It’s another big blow to an already embattled sector.
In June, ANZ’s NZ chief executive David Hisco departed suddenly under a cloud relating to inappropriate expense claims.
The Reserve Bank is still looking into an unusual transaction around the sale of the ANZ-owned house that Hisco lived in, to his wife for what looked like less than market value.
In February, National Australia Bank chief executive Andrew Thorburn (a former BNZ boss) and chairman Ken Henry resigned after they were singled out in the Hayne Banking Royal Commission report.
To lose one bank boss may be a misfortune, as Oscar Wilde might have said, to lose five looks like carelessness.
In fact, in Australia the whole sector got a drubbing from the Hayne Commission.
It highlighted systemic issues with treatment of customers.
In New Zealand a Banking Conduct and Culture review found no issues on the same scale.
But local banks (ANZ and BNZ) have been the gun for failing to manage their capital requirements properly.
Capital requirements — the amount of money banks are expected to keep in reserve to ensure they don’t collapse if there’s a financial crisis — have been another weight bearing down on banks this year. As well the struggles to manage existing rules, they will soon be required to hold more capital both here and in Australia.
This Thursday the New Zealand Reserve Bank will announce its final decision on capital proposals. It is unlikely bank bosses will love it. Outgoing Westpac chairman Maxted grabbed attention in New Zealand earlier this year when he took a combative approach to the proposed changes.
He told The Australian newspaper that his shareholders will not “take this on the chin” — that the outcome will be higher interest rates, less lending, or less investment in New Zealand.
Later, while speaking at an Auckland business lunch in September, he backed away from that aggressive line when he reiterated
Westpac’s long-term commitment to New Zealand.
This latest debacle will further undermine the ability of bank bosses to fight their corner on this issue.
Unfortunately for their shareholders they’ve pulled the rug out from under themselves with regard to any public support they might have had in this debate.
Which is a shame because there needs to be robust debate about the issue.
In short though, it has been a right old annus horribilis for the banks in 2019.
Unless of course we count the money . . . which, being at the heart of the business, we probably should.
For all the headlines and woes the banks are still making enormous amounts of money.
It’s true that bottom-line results have been off the record highs set in 2017 and 2018.
According to KPMG, the big four Aussie banks made in A$27 billion net profits in the last financial year.
That’s off 7.8 per cent from 2018 — which isn’t too bad when you consider the cyclical slowdown in the Australian economy and the decidedly average state of the housing market there.
In New Zealand, ANZ (our largest bank) also saw net profit fall about 8 per cent, to a paltry $1.8b.
Bank of New Zealand’s net profit dipped less than 1 per cent, but it still made $1.022b for the year to September 30.
Westpac made nearly $1b — up 3 per cent.
ASB reported a net profit of $1.27b for the year ended 30 June 2019 — an 8 per cent increase on the prior year.
So don’t cry too many tears, shareholders are doing okay. And the executives?
Well, even those making sudden departures have done so with million-dollar payouts.
ANZ’s Hisco still received A$1.497 million in fixed pay and deferred payments in 2019, the annual report showed.
Westpac’s Hartzer leaves with a A$2.7m golden handshake.
It is fair to say that the banks have warned profits will likely get squeezed further in the next few years as low rates, tougher regulation and higher capital requirements and slower economic growth erodes margins.
This could present a genuine risk for the New Zealand economy if credit tightens to the point that businesses can’t invest in growth.
But should we believe them?
After such a run of leadership failures we are now into “cry wolf” territory.
At that Auckland lunch six weeks ago, Westpac’s Maxted reassured the audience that the bank was working “desperately” to maintain a positive relationship with the regulators.
Did he have a clue what was coming for Westpac? Who knows.
Perhaps we should instead focus on his final message to the audience, one which seems likely to hold up whatever happens next:
“You should feel very comfortable that the banking system in Australia is as strong as it’s ever been, in terms of capital, in terms of profitability — it is isn’t as high as it was two or three years ago — but we’re still a profitable sector.”