Major lenders capitalise on mortgage market volatility
After losing share in May and June, the major banks and their subsidiaries have regained lost ground over the past couple of months and accounted for 74.5 per cent of loans written by AFG brokers in August.Over the past 12 months, the major's share has been as high as 74.7 per cent in January and as low as 69.1 per cent in June.AFG general manager sales and operations Mark Hewitt said: "With regulator-enforced changes to investment and interest-only lending, this is the most disruptive period we have seen in the market for some time. "Major lenders are capitalising on this and using the size of their balance sheets to dominate their smaller competitors."ANZ captured the biggest share of AFG's business in August, accounting for 19.2 per cent of all mortgages written. Commonwealth Bank's share was 18.6 per cent (although the combined CBA and Bankwest share was 23.4 per cent).Westpac's share was 13 per cent, while the combined Westpac, Bank of Melbourne, BankSA and St George share was 25 per cent.The combined National Australia Bank and NAB Broker share of AFG's business was 6.9 per cent.Among second tier lenders, Bank of Queensland and Suncorp each had a 3.6 per cent share, Macquarie Bank had 3.2 per cent, and ING Direct two per cent.Second tier lenders had a relatively high share of AFG's fixed-rate lending, at 45.3 per cent. Bank of Queensland led the way with share of 15.8 per cent, followed by Suncorp with 8.1 per cent.