Consolidation to cost banking jobs
(11 January 2011 – Australia) With plans to cut expenses this year, it is expected that Australia’s biggest banks will plan to slash thousands of jobs across the country as they consolidate record profits.
This week The Daily Telegraph reported Westpac, Commonwealth Bank (CBA) and ANZ had all drawn up plans to cut expenses as funding costs soar and mortgage rates slowed.
Commonwealth Bank has started an internal program code-named 'Project 35', hoping to achieve a 35 percent cost-to-income ratio for its retail banking unit by 2013 - down from 38.7 percent. This may result in axing more than 600 jobs.
Westpac chief executive Gail Kelly has said staff numbers are likely to 'trend downward' and, though the bank says it has no concrete plans to offer redundancies, analysts believe it will cut nearly 1600 jobs this year.
Sources at ANZ say the bank has started work on a new redundancy program which targets up to 1000 jobs - just four years after 1000 jobs were lost in a similar 2008 restructure.
Staff costs account for nearly 60 percent of the A$32 billion spent by the big banks each year. Analysts say Australia is experiencing the slowest rate of mortgage growth since World War II.
Commonwealth Bank has started an internal program code-named 'Project 35', hoping to achieve a 35 percent cost-to-income ratio for its retail banking unit by 2013 - down from 38.7 percent. This may result in axing more than 600 jobs.
Westpac chief executive Gail Kelly has said staff numbers are likely to 'trend downward' and, though the bank says it has no concrete plans to offer redundancies, analysts believe it will cut nearly 1600 jobs this year.
Sources at ANZ say the bank has started work on a new redundancy program which targets up to 1000 jobs - just four years after 1000 jobs were lost in a similar 2008 restructure.
Staff costs account for nearly 60 percent of the A$32 billion spent by the big banks each year. Analysts say Australia is experiencing the slowest rate of mortgage growth since World War II.
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