Heritage and People’s Choice resi portfolio up $900m

Mutual bank Heritage and People’s Choice has announced in its results for the financial year ended 30 June 2023 that its residential lending portfolio has grown 5.2 per cent, from approximately $17.4 billion to $18.3 billion.

Additionally, the mutual bank has reported total loans and advances of $19.1 billion, an increase of 5 per cent from a combined $18.2 billion, and retail deposits of $17.8 billion, revealing an increase of 3.5 per cent.

Since Heritage and People’s Choice was formed on 1 March 2023 through the merger of Heritage Bank Limited and People’s Choice Credit Union, the growth reported compares the newly formed organisation as at 30 June 2023 with the combined positions of Heritage Bank and People’s Choice as at 30 June 2022. As such, the mutual bank also reported total assets of 23.3 billion, an increase of 2.6 per cent on the combined balances from the pre-merged entities.

Heritage and People’s Choice chief executive Peter Lock said the mutual bank has made “a strong start” in its effort to “become an iconic purpose-driven alternative to the major banks” as it avoided potential disruptions that could have occurred from the merger process.

“We’re at the early stages of our merger but our achievements to this point have met all of our expectations,” Mr Lock said.

“We’ve not only grown our membership, lending, deposits and assets, we’ve also maintained high levels of customer satisfaction, built a strong values-based employee culture and delivered a solid profit despite the costs of integration.

“At the same time, we’ve also started delivering the member benefits that we committed to in the lead-up to the merger.”

Heritage and People’s Choice are yet to unveil a unified brand following the merger, however Mr Lock reassured that the organisation was “on track to announce a single new brand in the coming months”.

He added that the announcement of a new name and brand will be a “major step forward” in the organisation’s aspirations.

“Our 2022/23 results show we can confidently move ahead to create something truly special in the Australian banking sector,” Mr Lock added.

“We will continue to drive our multi-year integration plan to form one organisation and further realise the benefits of the merger. We will invest in creating a simpler, modern IT platform while providing even higher levels of reliability and security.”

[RELATED: CIO appointed for Heritage-People's Choice merged entity]

Written by Adrian Suljanovic

Last Updated: 10 October 2023

Published: 11 October 2023