Bendigo Bank

Bendigo Bank (ASX: BEN) is an Australian financial institution, operating primarily in retail banking. The company merged with Adelaide Bank in November 2007, with shareholders voting in March 2008 to change the merged company’s name to Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Limited.^[1]

Before the merger, Bendigo Bank delivered its products and services through almost 900 outlets Australia-wide, including more than 160 company owned branches, 220 community owned Community Bank branches of Bendigo Bank, 100 agencies and 400 Elders Rural Bank outlets. The bank's branches are primarily in Victoria and Queensland. The merged bank now has over 400 branches, including 25 that came with the merger with Adelaide Bank. The bank's national headquarters remain in the city of Bendigo, and it has regional headquarters in Melbourne Docklands, Ipswich, Queensland and Adelaide, South Australia.

Community Bank is an innovative franchise program in which the local community owns and operates a Bendigo Bank branch (which is separately incorporated) and Bendigo Bank provides all the banking infrastructure and support. The community company and Bendigo Bank share all branch revenue with whatever is left over, after the company pays its branch running costs, remaining as profit. The program was a response to the massive closure of bank branches in rural areas. Bendigo Bank has since extended the program to areas that have bank service.

History and development

The company started in 1858 as a fixed-term (terminating) building society to improve conditions in the Bendigo goldfields during the Victorian gold rush.

At seven years old, in 1865, the company restructured, taking the name Bendigo Mutual Permanent Land and Building Society, which incorporated in Victoria 11 years afterwards. It continued to expand its holdings when, in 1978, it merged with Bendigo and Eaglehawk Star, a building society established in 1901.

Further growth involved the acquisition of the building societies Sandhurst, in 1983, and Sunraysia, in 1985, a merger with Sandhurst Trustees Ltd and the acquisition of Capital and Compass building societies.

In 1982 BBS became the first financial institution in Australia to introduce successfully both Visa credit and debit cards.

In 2002 Bendigo Bank introduced the first "Green Loans" in Australia and formed "Community Sector Banking", a banking joint venture with the not-for-profit sector.

1993 saw BBS receive a stockmarket listing. Its growth continued throughout the 90s when it acquired National Mortgage Market Corporation Limited in 1995, a mortgage-manager company focussed on loan introducers and brokers. In that year BBS converted to a bank with the name Bendigo Bank and, further, acquired Monte Paschi Australia, which it renamed Cassa Commerciale Australia in 1997.

Bendigo Bank’s "Community Bank" program began in 1998—the first branches opened in the western Victoria towns of Minyip and Rupanyup on 26 June and the first metropolitan branch in the outer eastern suburb of Upwey on 19 October.

The late 1990s saw a further development when Bendigo Bank and Elders Australia formed Elders Rural Bank, a joint venture company focused on agribusiness and rural Australia. Bendigo Bank was also the first financial institution to introduce a mortgage offset account, now a standard banking product in Australia.

In 1999 the bank formed an alliance involving mutual shareholding with IOOF.

The bank received its operating licence in 2000 and absorbed the First Australian Building Society in Queensland, acquiring a new regional headquarters in Ipswich. That same year saw a $A75 million head office expansion in Bendigo.

Five years later Bendigo bank built a regional headquarters on Harbour Esplanade in Melbourne, Docklands.

In 2007 Bendigo Bank rejected Bank of Queensland's merger/takeover proposal,^[2] while agreeing to merge with Adelaide Bank. The $A4 billion merger was completed on 30 November.^[1] Subsequently, shareholders voted to change the merged company’s name to Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Limited.

On 11 December 2008, Bendigo Bank's new headquarters in Bendigo was completed. The 26th Prime Minister of Australia, Kevin Rudd, was present at the opening.

References

External links

• Bendigo Bank — Official site
• Elders Rural Bank — Official site
• Community Bank — Official site
• National Mortgage Market Corporation — Official site