Australian banks have copped a fair bit of flack lately. Many accuse them of booking large profits while reducing staff and passing on less than the full RBA cash rate cuts all in the pursuit of very large profits. On a recent OLO thread, one poster suggested a super tax for banks to fund "social reform" spending.

However, not too long ago many were relieved that Australia dodged the worse of the GFC and this can be partially attributed to the relative conservative nature of the local banking system (in contrast to the awful situation then in the US).

My opinion is that the banks are businesses, the big dollar profits quoted are “reasonable” when compared to their turnover and they owe a return on investment to the shareholders, which include many superannuation investments which will ultimately be returned to the mums and dads on retirement (minus some fees, but that’s another topic). We need to get away from the 19th century Punch images of the fat-cat capitalist bankers and be realistic about assessing modern corporations. These institutions seem to be operating conservatively in a shaky global climate and it was this attitude that helped us dodge the direct bullet strike a few years ago (just a flesh wound).

And to put it into perspective, I’m reasonably happy with the mortgage interest rate I pay today compared to the 14% I started at in the early 90’s.

So, should we be quietly confident and thankful that the Aussie banks have a good steady hand on the tiller or should we be angry that they seem to be reluctant to follow the RBA monetary policy detail to the second decimal place and suggest that they are operating as a greedy oligopoly that is a law unto itself?

The fractional reserve system of counterfeiting our currencies must end.Banks should only be allowed to loan out money that already exists.

When banks create from nothing the money to equal our increates in productivity + inflation, this makes us their debt slaves.

Banks produce nothing of tangible worth yet are the most powerful institutions on the planet.Only sovereign Govts restricted by a proper constitution should be able to create new money that equals our productivity.This means we will all pay far less tax.It happened in Australia pre-1915 when we got the income tax. Now more taxes!

Banks produce nothing?
They under pin every thing man has achieved!
Are in it to make money not Friends.
Are private enterprises and LEND their cash.
I pay no interest, I always knew my home would be that not a status symbol, palace, I paid cash, you still can,in an area not wanted by upwardly mobile self indulgent and made it my palace.
Banks do not pretend to be Charity's.

I don't mind their conduct, it's the absolute bullsh1t they go on about to justify most of their moves. Cost of funds are hurting us blah blah blah. They really think we're stupid. They're as bad as the airline industry deciding fuel is a separate expense that needs a levy. It's a bloody cost of your business! Not my problem!

Imagine if plumbers decided to bung on a fuel levy, or a cost of tools levy. Fuel goes up and down, cost of funds goes up and down, just shut up, advertise your best rate and stop all the moaning and self serving justifications. We will never be your friend! It's business!

Or at least if you have to speak, why not just say 'we want to continue making more profit than last year for our shareholders, regardless of the general economic climate, and people are saving too much and not borrowing lately, so we'll just have to increase our margins.'

*advertise your best rate and stop all the moaning and self serving justifications*

Hang on Houllie, its not the banks doing the moaning. Its the
treasurer, its Hockey, both playing politics. Its TV sensationalism,
it keeps bums on seats, etc. The public are simply the gullible
suckers, so the banks justify their position. The moaning is being
done by the rest.

Actually I think Ozzie banks are very good, ---- at ripping us off as long as they can get away with it.

I have a couple of offset/sub accounts on my cheque account. When established a couple of years ago, in a similar interest environment, with perhaps lower offshore costs, these accounts were paying 6.25% interest.

With my last couple of statements I noticed the interest payed into these accounts had reduced somewhat, although the capital had not reduced.

When queried they admitted they had unilaterally reduced the interest on these accounts by 1.75%. They admitted they had no intention of notifying me of this fact.

Having withdrawn this money, [I'm thinking of buying gold], I have suddenly received a flood of offers from the bank, of new products, now available to me, offering similar interest to what I was receiving previously.

Yep, they are bl00dy good all right, at using sneaky ways to get at us, so Oz banks could be called good, it's just at what that is questionable.