BNK Banking Corp is undertaking a strategic review of the company after receiving “several unsolicited approaches from interested parties.”
Liberty Financial is one interested party, animated market chatter suggests.
Another prospect is Bermuda-based investment company Somers Ltd, which owns 14.2 per cent of BNK Group. Somers made an unsuccessful bid earlier this year for another of its portfolio holdings, Thorn Group, and Somers is already the major owner of Resimac.
BNK chair Don Koch said in a statement there is no assurance that the board will pursue a transaction as a result of the review.
“The review will include an assessment of all strategic options available to BNK to unlock and enhance further value for BNK shareholders,” Koch said.
The board has engaged corporate adviser Gresham and law firm Mills Oakley to assist with the review.
BNK’s core business is mortgage aggregation – a market where there has been some takeover activity this year.
REA Group acquired Mortgage Choice and will merge it with its own broker division Smartline. AFG made an aborted attempt to merge with Connective and commercial finance broker COG Financial Services acquired an 80 per cent interest in Access Capital, an asset finance broker in South Australia and the Northern Territory.
BNK’s Finsure division settled A$22.2 billion of mortgages in the year to June 2021, an increase of 42.4 per cent over the previous year. The aggregation loan book grew 24.5 per cent to $56.6 billion. Broker numbers grew 15 per cent to 2000.
The banking division settled $562 million of mortgages, an increase of 25.5 per cent. The bank’s mortgage portfolio was unchanged at $2.5 billion.
On the funding side, deposits grew 83.8 per cent to $635.6 million and the group launched its first securitisation warehouse, a $250 million facility funded by Bendigo and Adelaide Bank.
The group made a net profit of $5.6 million for the year to June – up from $3.8 million in 2019/20. Loan impairments were $437,000. Aggregation contributed the great majority of group earnings.