CBA has hit back at accusations that banks are constraining growth by restricting credit to small businesses.
With Goldman Sachs economists describing business borrowing in Australia as “anaemic” and analysts accusing banks of cherry-picking clients following lower risk tolerance post-GFC, CBA’s Grahame Peterson has defended the bank’s position.
“We're not capital constrained, we're not constrained by credit policy; we've been very consistent with our clients and our approval rates are relatively similar (since pre-GFC) and we're very keen to do business,” the bank’s head of business and private banking told The Australian.
“The reality is if you look at any of the data out there, pre-GFC roughly two-thirds of business enterprises borrowed or had some form of debt, and now post-GFC the number is around 30 per cent."
The business banking market remains intensely competitive, said Petersen.
Where would the logic be for any enterprise to say: 'No I don't want to do business?'”
Petersen said confidence had improved, but businesses had not yet started borrowing more.
