Westpac

This article is about the bank. For the defunct airline, see Western Pacific Airlines.

This article is about the bank. For the Rescue Helicopter, see Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter.

Westpac Banking Corporation ASX: [WBC] NZX: [WBC], usually called Westpac, is the fourth largest bank in Australasia, after the National Australia Bank, Commonwealth Bank and ANZ Bank and one of the largest banks in the South Pacific. The bank began life as the Bank of New South Wales in 1817 (making it the oldest bank in Australia), but after various mergers became Westpac in 1982. The name is derived from the fact its major operations are in the Western Pacific.

Contents

1 Core Business Activities

1.1 Business and Consumer Banking
1.2 Wealth Management
1.3 Westpac Institutional Bank (WIB)
1.4 New Zealand Retail
1.5 Pacific Banking
1.6 Roger Award

2 History
3 See also
4 External links

Core Business Activities

Westpac's core businesses consist of five main areas of business, through which serves around 8.2 million customers. These five business areas are:

Business and Consumer Banking

This includes deposit taking, transaction accounts, credit cards and other lending. Westpac is a major home loan provider and also serve the finance needs of business customers with a turnover of up to $20 million. Investment, superannuation and general and life insurance products are also sold through the branch network.

Wealth Management

This covers the asset accumulation, investment management and life insurance operations in Australia and New Zealand. Wealth Management designs, manufactures and services financial products to allow customers to create, manage and protect their wealth. It also includes managed investments, life insurance, superannuation and discount broking. There is also custody and settlement services to institutional customers and fund managers.

Westpac Institutional Bank (WIB)

This business offers financial services to the corporate and institutional customer base, helping and advising in the management of cash, funding, capital and market risk for enterprises and institutions in Australia and New Zealand..

New Zealand Retail

This unit offers a whole range of consumer and corporate services to clients throughout New Zealand. It is the dominant provider of banking services to small to medium business and is the banker of the New Zealand government.

Pacific Banking

Westpac commenced operations in Fiji in 1901 and Papua New Guinea in 1910. It now operates in seven south Pacific nations. This unit is headquartered in Sydney, Australia, and offers a wide range of financial service, including electonic banking (via online banking, ATMs and EFTPOS), deposit, loan, transaction accounts and international trade facilities to personal and business customers through a vast network of branches.

Roger Award

In 2005 Westpac won the Roger Award for The Worst Transnational Corporation operating in New Zealand.

History

In 1817, the Bank of New South Wales was founded in Sydney as the first bank in Australia. Throughout the 19th and early 20th century, the Bank opened branches throughout Oceania, at Moreton Bay (Brisbane) in 1850, then in Victoria (1851), New Zealand (1861), South Australia (1877), Western Australia (1883), Fiji (1901), Papua New Guinea (1910) and Tasmania (1910).

1927: BNSW acquired the Western Australian Bank.
1931: It acquired the Australian Bank of Commerce, which had branches in both New South Wales and Queensland.
1942: BNSW suspended operations in Papua New Guinea as the Japanese Army captured many of the towns in which it had branches and agencies, and bombed Port Moresby. It resumed operations in 1946.
1970: It established a branch on Tarawa in Kiribati (ex-Gilbert Islands), which also took over the government savings bank.
1971: It established a branch in the New Hebrides. The next year HSBC and Commercial Bank of Australia (see below) also established branches.
1974: The Bank of New Zealand (20%), Westpac (20%), Bank of Hawaii (20%), and the Government of Tonga (40%) established The Bank of Tonga as a joint venture.
1975: It incorporated its local business in Papua New Guinea as Bank of New South Wales(PNG).
1977: BNSW formed a joint venture in Samoa with Bank of Hawaii, Pacific Commercial Bank, by buying into Pacific Savings and Loan Company (est. 1969), in which Bank of Hawaii had had an ownership interest since 1971.
1982: BNSW merged with Commercial Bank of Australia to form Westpac Banking Corporation.
1984: The original agreement between BNSW and the government in the Gilbert and Ellice Islands expired and Westpac and the government of Kiribati formed Bank of Kiribati as a 51%-49% joint venture. Bank of Kiribati also fulfilled the functions of a reserve or central bank.
1985: Westpac replaced Barclays Bank in the National Bank of Tuvalu (est. 1981) in Tuvalu (ex-Ellice Islands), taking 40% of the shares as well as a 10-year management contract.
1988: Westpac acquired the European Pacific Banking Corporation in the Cook Islands and a HSBC subsidiary, the Solomon Islands Banking Corporation, which HSBC had established as a branch in 1973. Westpac also acquired HSBC's operations in Fiji and the New Hebrides, and established a branch in Niue that is the only bank in that country.
1990: Bank of New Zealand sold half its shares in Bank of Tonga to Westpac and half to Bank of Hawaii, giving each of them 30%. Westpac bought Banque Indosuez's operations in New Caledonia and Tahiti. (Banque de l'Indochine, which later merged into Banque Indosuez, had established itself in New Caledonia in 1888 and in Papeete, Tahiti in 1905. In both places Indochine functioned as the bank of issue until 1966-7.)
1992: Westpac recorded a 1.6 billion dollar loss, which at the time, was the largest loss for an Australian corporation.
1995: Westpac sold its shares in National Bank of Tuvalu to the government, which now wholly-owns the bank.
1996: Westpac Holdings NZ bought TrustBanks, a chain of regional banks owned by Community Trusts, for NZD1.2 billion to form NZ largest bank WestpacTrust. The bank had promised to keep the funding to Community Trusts flowing and to keep "Trust" in its name. However, Community Trust funding has slowed to a trickle, and in 1992 the bank quietly changed its name to Westpac.
1998: Westpac sold its operations in New Caledonia and Tahiti to Société Générale, which merged them with Société Générale Calédonienne de Banque (est. 1971) and Banque de Polynésie (est. 1973), respectively.
2001: The government of Kiribati sought to reduce Westpac's share in Bank of Kiribati from 51 to 49%, leading Westpac to sell its shares back to the government. Bank of Hawaii sold its interest in Pacific Commercial Bank (42.7%) to Westpac, which held an equal portion. Westpac offered Samoan investors, who held the remaining shares, the same price it had paid Bank of Hawaii. Westpac now owns 93.5% of Westpac Bank Samoa and Samoan companies and individuals own 6.5%. In Tonga, Bank of Hawaii sold its shares in Bank of Tonga to Westpac, giving Westpac 60% ownership of the bank.
2004: The Reserve Bank of New Zealand requires Westpac to incorporate its NZ branches network. Westpac had preferred to continue to operate its branches in NZ as branches of the parent as it has for over 140 years, but obviously will comply.

External links

[Westpac]
[Westpac New Zealand]

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