CBA restructure focuses on front end
The Commonwealth Bank has merged its Premium Financial Services (PFS) and Institutional and Business Services (IBS) divisions resulting in the departure of IBS group executive Michael Ullmer.
Ullmer’s departure comes after seven years with the group which included a stint as chief financial officer before heading up IBS.
The merged division, to be known as Premium Business Services will be headed by PFS group executive Michael Katz.
It will bring together services catered to high-net-worth clients including CommSec, CBA’s broking service and its private client services as well as the group’s business banking services.
In announcing the merger of the two division Commonwealth says it would boost the work is has already done in distributing its insurance and investments products, including the FirstChoice investment platform to retail banking customers.
The merger however does not affect the investment or insurances division or the bank’s advisory groups -Commonwealth Financial PlanningandFinancial Wisdom- but the bank’s divisions will all make use of its internal client management tool CommSee.
The moves are part of ongoing efforts in the bank to boost its market share through services to clients and were flagged at last year’s annual results announcement.
At that time the CBA stated growth in its wealth management division should exceed traditional banking divisions going forward and the value of its wealth management businesses has increased by $1.81 billion since the group’s merger with Colonial in 2001.
AUTHOR
Jason Spits
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