Big bank’s profits dive as fines and staff redundancies bite
A massive fine and thousands of job cuts have punched a ten per cent hole in ANZ’s profits.
ANZ’s bottom line has taken a big hit from a massive fine imposed by the market regulator and one-off costs related to 3500 staff redundancies.
The big four bank’s full-year statutory profit for the year to September 30 was down 10 per cent to $5.89 billion, and its cash profit fell 14 per cent to $5.8 billion, ANZ announced on Monday.
ANZ flagged recently that its profit would be impacted by $1.1 billion in significant items, including a $240 million fine from the market regulator for financial misconduct and a $414 million charge related to 3500 redundancies.
“While our financial performance held steady when excluding these items, our performance as a business reinforces the importance of our ANZ 2030 strategy,” chief executive Nuno Matos said, referring to his plan to reset the bank.
Matos said ANZ’s institutional and New Zealand divisions had performed consistently well, but its Australian retail and business banking divisions had underperformed.
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“Despite growth in both assets and deposits, intense competition and a falling interest rate environment impacted margins,” he said.
The percentage of Australians who consider ANZ their main financial institution ticked lower during the year, falling by a tenth of a percentage point to 11.7 per cent, even as retail savings and transactional account deposits grew 12 per cent to $100 billion.
Matos said work was underway to improve, including accelerating the integration of Suncorp Bank, delivering the ANZ Plus front-end interface for all ANZ customers and simplifying the bank and reducing duplication.
More than 30 per cent of the 3500 staff targeted for layoff had left the bank by the end of October, ANZ said.
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ANZ announced a final dividend of 83 cents per share, taking its total dividends for 2024/25 to $1.66, up from $1.64 last year.
ANZ also released its annual climate report on Monday detailing its commitments to the transition to net zero emissions.
Activist group Market Forces said the 93-page document showed that ANZ had reduced its exposure to oil and gas producers by $3.4 billion in the last few years – dropping from $7 billion in 2022 to $3.6 billion in 2025.
But Kyle Robertson, the group’s head of research, said that ANZ was still the worst of the big four banks when it came to climate change.
“ANZ claims it’s committed to the critical transition to a clean energy economy but is Australia’s biggest funder of coal, oil and gas expansion,” he said.
“This year alone, ANZ has financed massive deals for Woodside, BP, and Santos, all aggressively pursuing oil and gas expansion at the expense of a liveable climate.”
-with AAP
