The ACCC appears to have overestimated the strength of Australian mortgage competition when announcing last year that it would not oppose the Westpac / St George and Commonwealth Bank / Bankwest mergers.

The ACCC’s Public Competition Assessment in August 2008 calculated the merged Westpac / St George entity would at that point have had a mortgage market share of 21%. At the end of September 2009 the combined Westpac / St George entity has 23.4% mortgage market share, according to the forthcoming CoreData-brandmanagement Australian Mortgage Report.

In forming its view last year the ACCC noted a number of regional banks were expanding their presence in other states, citing Bankwest, Bank of Queensland, Suncorp and Bendigo Bank.
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Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan has held talks with the heads of the nation’s four biggest banks.

Mr Swan met the chief executives of the Commonwealth Bank, NAB, ANZ and Westpac in Canberra tonight, AAP understands.

The meeting comes amid continuing controversy over the federal government’s unlimited guarantee on bank deposits in response to the global financial crisis.
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The big four banks have all reduced their standard variable home loan rate by 80 basis points, passing on most of the Reserve Bank of Australia’s (RBA) full percentage point cut, as they try and recoup some of the increase in funding costs.

Westpac Banking Corporation, which is in talks to buy St George for $17.3 billion, reduced its rate to 8.56 per cent. The reduction will take effect on October 13, the Sydney-based bank said in a statement.

St George Bank Ltd late today announced that it would reduce its standard variable home loan rates for new and existing customers by 80 basis points to 8.57 per cent, effective October 13.
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