National Australia Bank has announced the restructuring of nabCapital at the same time as announcing a 25 per cent reduction in the company’s dividend for the 2009 half year.
NAB chief executive Cameron Clyne made the announcements to the Australian Securities Exchange this morning as part of a strategic agenda for the bank’s Australian and international businesses.
Referring to the restructure of nabCapital, Clyne said the markets, treasury services and specialised finance businesses would be maintained as a separate global business and would be renamed Wholesale Banking, while the corporate lending franchises would be merged with relevant regional business banks.
He said the bank would be exiting non-franchised related assets such as conduit assets “in an orderly manner”.
Discussing the dividend cut, he said that it reflected the banking group’s conservative setting and reflected the increasingly challenging external environment.
