NAB reports fastest growth in business lending since GFC

National Australia Bank (NAB) is building up numbers within its Business and Private Banking division on top of 550 new customer-facing roles added last year.

The big banking group announced its further push into the SME sector after exiting the last elements of MLC Wealth and on the back of a statutory net profit of $3,551 million and a 4.1% increase in cash earnings to $3,450 million.

Announcing its half-year results to the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) the big banking group also announced an increase in its interim dividend to 73 cents per share, fully franked.

It said that the result had been achieved during a period increased customer activity across all divisions of the bank, including the fastest growth in business lending since the global financial crisis (GFC).

The bank said it was pursuing ongoing simplification of its policies and processes, in conjunction with increased digitisation which was freeing up bankers and delivering quicker customer responses.

“Over the 12 months to March 2022 ‘time to yes’ on new lending more than halved and the number of transaction accounts opened digitally increased from 23% to 35%,” it said.