It is said that every dark cloud has a silver lining. That silver lining for Australia may be deliverance from a cartel of just four banks imposing usurious trading conditions on their unfortunate customers.
When other countries guaranteed bank deposits, Australia had little option than to follow suit. This prevented a run on the banks here, but transferred that calamity to the big investment firms managing superannuation and savings funds.
Investors rushed to withdraw to relocate their money to the banks where their money would be safe under the government's guarantee umbrella.
The result was inevitable. These trading houses applied a freeze on withdrawals, leaving citizens bereft of funds - and many facing abject poverty.
The government has reacted by funding the Australian Financial Regulator ( AFR ) with $ 83 million to expedite applications from these firms to meet Australian Prudential Regulatory requirements - to become authorised deposit taking institutions - or in other words - banks !
We are about to see a surge of new banks in this country - and that is extremely bad news indeed for the four vultures that have used every possible device to extract fees and charges from their customers to make obscene profits.
The four big banks are about to be hoisted with their own petard. They convinced their customers that bank branches were not necessary - and closed thousands, forcing people to use ATM's and EFTPOS.
The new banks will not need to open a network of branches, merely to form liaisons with the existing network of " for profit " ATM's in every petrol station, club and shopping centre - and to get a share of the market they will offer terms of trading that will make the four big banks blanch.
We are about to see the reappearance of a word long missing from the banking scene - competition !
Happy days are here again ! Until the new banks start adopting the creed of " bigger is better " - and start merging.
About then the " greed is good " mantra will reappear !
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