Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA):
Commonwealth Bank has further clamped down on investor property lending to stay within the 10 per cent speed limit enforced by the banking regulator. CBA said yesterday it had reduced the maximum loan-to-value ratio for investment home loans to 90 per cent, meaning investors must have a 10 per cent deposit. The change relates only to investment home loans and is effective immediately. CBA executive general manager home buying Dan Huggins said the bank was constantly reviewing its home loan portfolio. “(This) change will enable us to meet our customers’ needs, while further strengthening our high quality home loan business and ensuring we continue to meet our responsible lending and regulatory standards,” Mr Huggins said. Last month, CBA froze new lending to property investors looking to switch banks and refinance their mortgage.
Myer Holdings Ltd (MYR):
It’s often said that the way to a man’s (or woman’s) heart is through their stomach. Now department store Myer is taking a leaf out of the book of rival David Jones and overhauling its food services in an attempt to give customers new reasons to spend. Unlike David Jones, Myer has no plans to sell chilled pre-cooked meals or open, stand-alone food halls. However, encouraged by the popularity of Italian cafe Brunetti in its Melbourne CBD store and The Break cafe in its newly revamped Warringah store, Myer plans to create new food destinations in key stores. Myer chief executive Richard Umbers – who reports Myer’s first-half results on Thursday – believes food, cafes and services have become an increasingly important part of the customer experience. In a management reshuffle last week, Mr Umbers seconded one of Myer’s most senior executives, executive general manager stores Tony Sutton, to a new role overseeing the food and services team now managed by Scott Whiteley. Mr Sutton is the architect of Myer’s Giftorium and Wonderland concepts, which helped attract thousands of shoppers into flagship stores for Christmas.
Tabcorp Holdings Ltd (TAH):
Tabcorp has taken the highly unusual step of withdrawing from the competition watchdog’s ‘‘informal’’ process to clear its proposed $11 billion merger with Tatts Group, and has instead taken its case straight to the Australian Competition Tribunal. The move comes just days after the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission gave the deal a qualified green light, and is a further sign how important Tatts is to Tabcorp and how keen it is to clinch the deal. While it is not unusual to see a company that has had a deal rejected by the ACCC take its case to the tribunal, Tabcorp appears to have made a preemptive strike before the watchdog has even made a final decision. ACCC chairman Rod Sims, who said last week the commission was satisfied that there was significant competition in the wagering market, said on Monday he was surprised at Tabcorp’s move. ‘‘We completely respect their right to take whatever process they want,’’ he said. ‘‘Those processes are available. We are surprised they have done what they have done.’’ While the watchdog has forced Tabcorp to sell its Odyssey Gaming Services business to allay concerns about competition levels in the gaming monitoring sector – and Tabcorp said on Monday its sale process was ‘‘well advanced’’ – the gaming company will abandon talks with the competition watchdog completely.
Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Company Limited (SOL) & Hunter Hall International Ltd (HHL):
Washington H Soul Pattinson has moved to consolidate its hold on a merged Hunter Hall International and Pengana Capital Asset Management, lifting its conditional bid by almost a fifth to $2.60 a share. In a move that briefly lifted the offer price for the shares above the market yesterday, the Millner-family controlled investment conglomerate said it would pay an extra 40c a share if it got to 44 per cent of Hunter Hall company. The latest move is a 40c increase on the previous $2.20 a share offer, but the offer price falls back to $2 a share if the 44 per cent hurdle is not cleared. Soul Patts’ increase followed a deal announced last week for Hunter Hall to make a reverse takeover bid for Pengana, in which Soul Patts holds a 37 per cent stake. That deal is thought likely to end the monthslong bidding war for founder Peter Hall’s 44.05 per cent stake after he suddenly quit the company last year.
Xero Limited (XRO):
The chief executive of listed accounting software business Xero has claimed machine learning-based automation will be a bigger change than the advent of cloud computing, as it starts to offer options to automate accounting tasks. Xero boss Rod Drury said the company would unveil a new feature to its software this week which would automate the coding of invoices and bank transactions for its small business customers, work that has been conducted personally by business owners or accountants until now. The process was targeted for automation after Xero’s Find & Recode feature showed 3.1 million invoices had been incorrectly recorded by its 862,000 subscribers in the 18 months to September 2016. It is the first introduction of machine learning automation at Xero since it shifted its infrastructure to run on Amazon Web Services in 2016. Mr Drury said the application of machine learning was the first of its kind in the industry and signalled the dawning of a new wave of innovation for accounting. ‘‘We think machine learning will be a bigger thing than the move to the cloud’.
(Source: AIMS)
Commonwealth Bank has further clamped down on investor property lending to stay within the 10 per cent speed limit enforced by the banking regulator. CBA said yesterday it had reduced the maximum loan-to-value ratio for investment home loans to 90 per cent, meaning investors must have a 10 per cent deposit. The change relates only to investment home loans and is effective immediately. CBA executive general manager home buying Dan Huggins said the bank was constantly reviewing its home loan portfolio. “(This) change will enable us to meet our customers’ needs, while further strengthening our high quality home loan business and ensuring we continue to meet our responsible lending and regulatory standards,” Mr Huggins said. Last month, CBA froze new lending to property investors looking to switch banks and refinance their mortgage.
Myer Holdings Ltd (MYR):
It’s often said that the way to a man’s (or woman’s) heart is through their stomach. Now department store Myer is taking a leaf out of the book of rival David Jones and overhauling its food services in an attempt to give customers new reasons to spend. Unlike David Jones, Myer has no plans to sell chilled pre-cooked meals or open, stand-alone food halls. However, encouraged by the popularity of Italian cafe Brunetti in its Melbourne CBD store and The Break cafe in its newly revamped Warringah store, Myer plans to create new food destinations in key stores. Myer chief executive Richard Umbers – who reports Myer’s first-half results on Thursday – believes food, cafes and services have become an increasingly important part of the customer experience. In a management reshuffle last week, Mr Umbers seconded one of Myer’s most senior executives, executive general manager stores Tony Sutton, to a new role overseeing the food and services team now managed by Scott Whiteley. Mr Sutton is the architect of Myer’s Giftorium and Wonderland concepts, which helped attract thousands of shoppers into flagship stores for Christmas.
Tabcorp Holdings Ltd (TAH):
Tabcorp has taken the highly unusual step of withdrawing from the competition watchdog’s ‘‘informal’’ process to clear its proposed $11 billion merger with Tatts Group, and has instead taken its case straight to the Australian Competition Tribunal. The move comes just days after the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission gave the deal a qualified green light, and is a further sign how important Tatts is to Tabcorp and how keen it is to clinch the deal. While it is not unusual to see a company that has had a deal rejected by the ACCC take its case to the tribunal, Tabcorp appears to have made a preemptive strike before the watchdog has even made a final decision. ACCC chairman Rod Sims, who said last week the commission was satisfied that there was significant competition in the wagering market, said on Monday he was surprised at Tabcorp’s move. ‘‘We completely respect their right to take whatever process they want,’’ he said. ‘‘Those processes are available. We are surprised they have done what they have done.’’ While the watchdog has forced Tabcorp to sell its Odyssey Gaming Services business to allay concerns about competition levels in the gaming monitoring sector – and Tabcorp said on Monday its sale process was ‘‘well advanced’’ – the gaming company will abandon talks with the competition watchdog completely.
Washington H. Soul Pattinson and Company Limited (SOL) & Hunter Hall International Ltd (HHL):
Washington H Soul Pattinson has moved to consolidate its hold on a merged Hunter Hall International and Pengana Capital Asset Management, lifting its conditional bid by almost a fifth to $2.60 a share. In a move that briefly lifted the offer price for the shares above the market yesterday, the Millner-family controlled investment conglomerate said it would pay an extra 40c a share if it got to 44 per cent of Hunter Hall company. The latest move is a 40c increase on the previous $2.20 a share offer, but the offer price falls back to $2 a share if the 44 per cent hurdle is not cleared. Soul Patts’ increase followed a deal announced last week for Hunter Hall to make a reverse takeover bid for Pengana, in which Soul Patts holds a 37 per cent stake. That deal is thought likely to end the monthslong bidding war for founder Peter Hall’s 44.05 per cent stake after he suddenly quit the company last year.
Xero Limited (XRO):
The chief executive of listed accounting software business Xero has claimed machine learning-based automation will be a bigger change than the advent of cloud computing, as it starts to offer options to automate accounting tasks. Xero boss Rod Drury said the company would unveil a new feature to its software this week which would automate the coding of invoices and bank transactions for its small business customers, work that has been conducted personally by business owners or accountants until now. The process was targeted for automation after Xero’s Find & Recode feature showed 3.1 million invoices had been incorrectly recorded by its 862,000 subscribers in the 18 months to September 2016. It is the first introduction of machine learning automation at Xero since it shifted its infrastructure to run on Amazon Web Services in 2016. Mr Drury said the application of machine learning was the first of its kind in the industry and signalled the dawning of a new wave of innovation for accounting. ‘‘We think machine learning will be a bigger thing than the move to the cloud’.
(Source: AIMS)
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