Smith defends ANZ rate decision
(14 December 2011 — Australia) ANZ chief executive Mike Smith reiterated the bank’s decision to decouple mortgage rate changes from Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) interest rate moves.
ANZ announced its rate cut last week after two days deliberation and said it would review its interest rates on the second Friday of each month, regardless of whether the RBA moved rates at its monthly meeting, which would fall 10 days earlier.
Smith wrote in The Australian Financial Review that the gap between popular expectations and the realities of the global crisis seems to be widening.
'As the crisis in Europe continues to deepen, the choices for commercial banks are becoming more and more limited,' he said. 'While it is easy to say this is the banks’ problem, if there is one lesson the first round of the global crisis taught us, it is that a strong banking sector and well-managed government finances are the best protection the economy can have to avoid a coordinated downturn,' he said.
Smith wrote in The Australian Financial Review that the gap between popular expectations and the realities of the global crisis seems to be widening.
'As the crisis in Europe continues to deepen, the choices for commercial banks are becoming more and more limited,' he said. 'While it is easy to say this is the banks’ problem, if there is one lesson the first round of the global crisis taught us, it is that a strong banking sector and well-managed government finances are the best protection the economy can have to avoid a coordinated downturn,' he said.
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