ANZ sees dealer group sale as a done deal

While ANZ has signalled it is reviewing the sale of its wealth and superannuation businesses in the wake of the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority (APRA) initiating legal action against IOOF, its chief executive, Shayne Elliott, has signalled to shareholders the sale of its aligned dealer groups is a done deal.

Addressing ANZ’s annual general meeting, Elliott listed the sale of its aligned dealer groups in Australia as being among the transactions completed as part of the bank’s broader business simplification process.

He said that in the past three years, ANZ had changed its business more than at any time since 1951 and that it had announced the sale and exit of more than 20 businesses.

“We’ve reduced risk-weighted assets in our Institutional business by $44 billion,” he said. “We cut the number of retail products in Australia by more than a third. We improved cumbersome processes and decommissioned old systems.”

“This year alone, we have sold our joint-venture bank in Cambodia and our retail and commercial businesses in Papua New Guinea. “We also completed the sale of our Asian retail and commercial businesses, our life insurance business in New Zealand; and our aligned dealer groups here in Australia.”