CBA’s head of business banking, Mike Vacy-Lyle, says the bank is targeting a bigger slice of the business banking pie despite a slew of businesses, especially in the property and hospitality sector, feeling the pinch.
“We’ve seen an unprecedented increase so far in our number of active business banking accounts,” he said. “We are now opening more than 5000 business transaction accounts a week.”CBA’s growth comes despite some businesses, especially property developers, facing “incredibly high” levels of liquidations and insolvencies amid a labour shortage, increasing input costs and fixed-price contracts.
However, CBA is eager to turn up the heat on its rivals, leveraging its position as the country’s dominant bank to grow lending to the large customer base of businesses that already rely on some of its other services. CBA on Monday announced it would partner with real estate software provider MRI Software, which processes about $2 billion worth of rent a month through its platform.