The author has been described by News Ltd as an "iconoclast", "Svengali", a pollie's "economist muse", and "pungently accurate". Fairfax says he is a "Renaissance man" and "one of Australia’s most respected analysts." Stephen Koukoulas concludes that he is "85% right", and "would make a great Opposition leader." Terry McCrann claims the author thinks "‘nuance’ is a trendy village in the south of France", but can be "scintillating" when he thinks "clearly". The ACTU reckons he’s "an enigma wrapped in a Bloomberg terminal, wrapped in some apparently well-honed abs."

Sunday, November 7, 2010

RBS on bank spreads, market shares and liability mix

RBS's two outstanding economists, Kieren Davies and Felicity Emmett, have once again delivered some interesting analysis. This week they turned their cross-hairs to the banking system. A few of their charts are excerpted below. The first shows the spread between the headline variable mortgage rate and the cash rate. The second illustrates the cross-sectional market share of the banks. CBA and Westpac alone account for around 50% of all housing finance flows in Australia today. The final two charts depict the change in the banks' funding bases over time.

at 5:09 PM