Macquarie continues to pull back from consumer finance, taking the decision yesterday to withdraw from instalment finance, the
Herald Sun reported. About 50 staff are affected.
Most of the job losses are expected to come from the Fundcorp business, which has around 10,500 fixed rate instalment loans on its books, according to the newspaper. Macquarie bought Fundcorp from its founders in mid 2005.
Through Fundcorp Macquarie provided retail point of sale finance, a niche dominated by GE Money and in which HSBC has been aggressive in recent years.
The bank's decision is another blow for the business plans of Virgin Money. Virgin wrote to customers advising them of the imminent launch of the new product and inviting them to register their interest.
Macquarie was to fund the Virgin Money loan. Macquarie also owns a 10 per cent stake in Virgin Money.
Virgin Money chief executive David Wakeley told the Herald Sun the company had been forced to abandon the launch of the personal loan offering because of Macquarie's withdrawal of funding.