A report on New Zealand's five main banks shows these Australian-owned institutions are bleeding customers heavily to New Zealand institutions, in particular state-owned Kiwibank.
Thursday, May 20th 2004, 3:52PM
by The Landlord
"The Australian banks as a group are losing market share in New Zealand," Merrill Lynch's Sydney-based analyst Hamish Carlisle writes in the 65-page report.
Based on Roy Morgan Research, the survey found 180,000 main bank customers switch banks every year and half of these are being lost to the likes of Kiwibank, building societies and credit unions. It said most high-value customers switch banks when they take out a new loan.
Mr Carlisle says the loss for the big banks is a "remarkable statistic" which "begs the question as to why customers are leaving the big banks".
