John Symond to stay as chairman of Aussie Home Loans

John Symond says he will stay on as chairman of Aussie Home Loans even if he sells his remaining stake to CBA.

Aussie Home Loans chairman John Symond will stay even if CBA buys the rest of the company. Picture: Britta Campion

John Symond has vowed to stay on as chairman of Aussie Home Loans regardless of whether he sells his remaining shareholding in the mortgage broking business to Commonwealth Bank this year or not.

With CBA fast approaching the midyear date on an option to buy the remaining 20 per cent of Aussie, speculation has intensified a deal may be sealed with Mr Symond in the back half of the year.

However, a spokesman for Mr Symond yesterday confirmed he would stay on as non-executive chairman of the business he founded in the 1990s.

“John Symond intends to ­remain as chairman of Aussie,” the spokesman said.

Mr Symond didn’t return calls.

Last month, Aussie chief James Symond — John’s nephew — told The Australian he had “no doubt CBA will go to 100 per cent ownership” of Aussie.

A CBA spokeswoman declined to comment but the final price is expected to be based on Aussie’s financial performance for the year to June 30.

However, the corporate regulator’s review of broker remuneration released this month has clouded brokers’ future earnings after raising a range of concerns about lending practices.

It also claimed “competition in the home loan market is affected by ownership relationships between lenders and aggregators”, citing how CBA, National Australia Bank and Macquarie owned brokers.

Morgan Stanley analyst Richard Wiles this week said that if trail commissions — paid by banks to brokers for the life of loans — were ultimately banned, “there could be some negative second-order impacts”.

“The major banks could see their earnings rise by 1-2 per cent if trail commissions are cut, all else equal,” he told clients.

“The banks could respond by reinvesting some of the savings into higher upfront commissions to capture volume growth.

“Meanwhile, mortgage brokers would likely seek to grow volumes to protect their revenues, leading to higher mortgage customer churn.”

Aussie, the nation’s biggest mortgage broking franchiser group, settled $22 billion of loans last calendar year, boosting the group’s commission and servicing book to more than $76bn.

James Symond last month flagged plans to expand Aussie’s network of stores from 205 to 300 by 2020, when he predicted its broker numbers would have ­expanded 7 per cent to 1500, and its servicing book hit $100bn.

CBA, the nation’s biggest ­lender, has the option of increasing its stake in Aussie after striking a deal with Mr Symond in late 2012 that included the bank ­paying a mooted $200 million to increase its ownership from 33 per cent to 80 per cent.

At CBA’s interim results last month, CBA chief Ian Narev said while he wanted to write more loans through branches, brokers had established a firm position in the market where they originated more than half of all new mortgages. “Our view on this has been the same for the last long period of time and I would say the same to John Symond,” he said.

“The brokers have established a proposition. We need to be part of it. We will be.”