Bank News Watch 26/03/2010

Federal treasurer Wayne Swan has again slammed Westpac, claiming the bank has become a “serial offender” in “taking its customers for a ride”.

Referring to Westpac’s latest decision on credit card interest rates and its supersized home loan rate hike in December, Swan said this was “exactly why people don’t like the big banks”.

At 7.01%, Westpac’s variable home loan rate is the highest of all the major lenders. By contrast, Credit Union Australia announced yesterday it was cutting its variable rate by 25 basis points, opening up a yawning gulf between it and the big banks. CUA’s standard variable rate is now 6.37%, 0.64% lower than Westpac’s.

A professor of finance at the University of NSW, Fariborz Moshirian, told The Australian Financial Review that there was in fact no justification for extra rate rises by the banks, as international credit markets had settled in recent months.

It seems that the out of control , out of touch Westpac Bank  are about to burst………give them enough rope I say ?