Bendigo and Adelaide Bank is an Australian financial institution, operating primarily in retail banking. The company was formed by the merger of Bendigo Bank and Adelaide Bank in November 2007. Before the merger, Bendigo Bank delivered its products and services through almost 900 outlets Australia-wide, including more than 160 company owned branches, 220 community owned ''Community Bank'' branches of Bendigo Bank, 100 agencies and 400 '' Elders'' outlets. The bank's branches are primarily in

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seychelle ...

and

Queensland ) , nickname = Sunshine State , image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia , subdivision_type = Country , subdivision_name = Australia , established_title = Before federation , establishe ...

. The merged bank now has over 400 branches, including 25 that came with the merger of Adelaide Bank. National headquarters remain in the city of Bendigo, with a major office in

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

South Australia South Australia (commonly abbreviated as SA) is a state in the southern central part of Australia. It covers some of the most arid parts of the country. With a total land area of , it is the fourth-largest of Australia's states and territories ...

and regional offices in Docklands, Melbourne and Ipswich, Queensland.

History and development

The company started in 1858 as a fixed-term (terminating)

building society A building society is a financial institution owned by its members as a mutual organization. Building societies offer banking and related financial services, especially savings and mortgage lending. Building societies exist in the United Kingd ...

to improve conditions in the Bendigo goldfields during the

Victorian gold rush The Victorian gold rush was a period in the history of Victoria, Australia approximately between 1851 and the late 1860s. It led to a period of extreme prosperity for the Australian colony, and an influx of population growth and financial capit ...

. At seven years old, in 1865, the company restructured, taking the name Bendigo Mutual Permanent Land and Building Society, which incorporated in Victoria 11 years afterwards. It continued to expand its holdings when, in 1978, it merged with Bendigo and Eaglehawk Star, a building society established in 1901. Further growth involved the acquisition of the building societies Sandhurst, in 1983, and Sunraysia, in 1985, a merger with Sandhurst Trustees Ltd and the acquisition of Capital and Compass building societies. In 1982 BBS became the first financial institution in Australia to introduce successfully both

Visa Visa most commonly refers to: *Visa Inc., a US multinational financial and payment cards company ** Visa Debit card issued by the above company ** Visa Electron, a debit card ** Visa Plus, an interbank network *Travel visa, a document that allows ...

credit and debit cards. 1993 saw BBS receive a stockmarket listing. Its growth continued throughout the 90s when it acquired National Mortgage Market Corporation Limited in 1995, a mortgage-manager company focussed on loan introducers and brokers. In that year BBS converted to a bank with the name Bendigo Bank. In 1997, Bendigo Bank acquired Monte Paschi Australia from Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, an Italian banking group, for AU$42.255M. Monte Paschi Australia was renamed Cassa Commerciale Australia in the same year. Bendigo Bank's "Community Bank" program began in 1998—the first branches opened in the western Victoria towns of

Minyip Minyip is a town in the Wimmera region of Victoria, Australia, north west of Melbourne. It is in the Shire of Yarriambiack local government area. At the , Minyip had a population of 524. The name "Minyip" is derived from an Aboriginal word fo ...

and

Rupanyup Rupanyup ( ) is a small town in rural Victoria, Australia. As of the , it had a population of 536. The name Rupanyup is an Aboriginal word meaning 'branch hanging over water'.Upwey on 19 October. The late 1990s saw a further development when Bendigo Bank and Elders Australia formed Elders Rural Bank, a joint venture company focused on agribusiness and

rural In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are descri ...

Australia. Bendigo Bank was also the first financial institution to introduce a mortgage offset account, now a standard banking product in Australia. In 1999 the bank formed an alliance involving mutual shareholding with

IOOF The Independent Order of Odd Fellows (IOOF) is a non-political and non-sectarian international fraternal order of Odd Fellowship. It was founded in 1819 by Thomas Wildey in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. Evolving from the Odd Fellows, Or ...

. The bank received its operating licence in 2000 and absorbed the

First Australian Building Society First Australian Building Society was a building society that operated in Queensland between 1997 and 2000. History The Ipswich and West Moreton Building Society, established in 1877, merged with the ''First Provincial Building Society'' on 4 ...

in Queensland, acquiring a new regional headquarters in Ipswich. That same year saw a A$75 million head office expansion in Bendigo. In 2002 Bendigo Bank introduced the first "Green Loans" in Australia and formed "Community Sector Banking", a banking joint venture with the not-for-profit sector. Three years later, Bendigo Bank built a regional headquarters on Harbour Esplanade in

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

, Docklands. In 2007 Bendigo Bank rejected Bank of Queensland's merger/takeover proposal, and merged with Adelaide Bank. The A$4 billion takeover was completed on 30 November. Subsequently, shareholders voted to change the company's name to Bendigo and Adelaide Bank Limited, with the change taking effect from 31 March 2008. On 11 December 2008, Bendigo Bank's new headquarters in Bendigo was completed. The 26th Prime Minister of Australia,

Kevin Rudd Kevin Michael Rudd (born 21 September 1957) is an Australian former politician and diplomat who served as the 26th prime minister of Australia from 2007 to 2010 and again from June 2013 to September 2013, holding office as the leader of the ...

, was present at the opening. On 16 December 2011, Bendigo Bank announced that it had reached agreement with the Bank of Cyprus Group to acquire its 100 per cent owned Australian subsidiary, Bank of Cyprus Australia Limited (BOCAL). The purchase was for an estimated total consideration of A$130 million. It was renamed Delphi Bank. In April 2013, Bendigo Bank's subsidiary 'Oxford Funding' was rebranded as Bendigo Debtor Finance, offering independent credit assessments and cash-flow solutions to businesses on a national level. In June 2014, the bank became the first in Australia to adopt an investment policy which shunned fossil fuel investments. "Specifically, the bank does not lend to companies for whom the core activity is the exploration, mining, manufacture or export of thermal coal or coal seam gas." On 1 March 2015, a group of credit unions diverged from

Cuscal Cuscal Limited is an Australian company that predominantly provides transactional banking, liquidity and capital management services and products to institutional customers including credit unions, mutual banks and superannuation funds. Cusca ...

and aligned with Bendigo and Adelaide Bank to form Alliance Bank. The credit unions were AWA Credit Union/Mutual ( Geelong, 1969), Circle Credit Co-operative Limited ( Deer Park, 1969), Service One Credit Union ( ACT, circa 1950), BDCU ( Berrima, 1963), and in 2018 NOVA (

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

, 1964). Alliance Bank maintains some autonomy, but conducts regulated banking activities through Bendigo and Adelaide Bank. They still market themselves under their original name suffixed with "Alliance Bank" and declare themselves agents of Bendigo and Adelaide Bank.

Community Bank program

Community banking is based on a 'profit-with-purpose' model, which means that profits are returned directly to the community that has generated them, after paying branch running costs. The program was a response to the massive closure of bank branches, predominantly in rural areas. Bendigo Bank has since extended the program to major metropolitan areas with existing bank services. Since 1998, Bendigo Community Banks have reinvested more than $272 million back into local communities. Subsidiaries of Bendigo and Adelaide Bank include Community Bank, Rural Bank, Up, Bendigo Debtor Finance (formerly Oxford Funding), Leveraged Equities, Sandhurst Trustees, Delphi Bank (formerly Bank of Cyprus Australia), Community Enterprise Foundation and Homesafe Solutions. , Bendigo and Adelaide Bank had acquired Wheeler Financial Services which was merged with Bendigo Financial Planning, and also acquired Southern Finance.

References

External links

Bendigo and Adelaide Bank
– Official site {{Authority control Banks of Australia Companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange 1858 establishments in Australia Banks established in 1858 Bendigo Mutual savings banks in Australia

History and development

Community Bank program

See also

References

External links