While he says businesses have been resilient so far, much will depend on the busy Christmas and new year period.Westpac’s brand-new business banking bosssays the fate of many struggling small firms will hinge on the Christmas and new year trading period when consumers will absorb further potential tightening from the Reserve Bank next week.
“The next three to six months will be very important,” Mr Miller, in his first interview since taking up the new role, told“The key risk is that we are, in a retail sense, coming into a very busy part of the year and, depending on how these businesses perform, the knock-on effects of good or bad performance will be felt more widely. That will help show whether there is a consumer confidence drop or not.
. Mr de Bruin resigned from Westpac, handing over the business bank to Mr Miller and the consumer portfolio to Jason Yetton.It fired the starting gun on a succession battle between the two executives when current Westpac CEO Peter King decides to retire.“I am focused on the division I have got,” he said. “There are a lot of things to do; a lot of things to be excited about – there is no capacity to think about anything else.