👉 Background: Macquarie was founded in 1969 and is best known for being one of Australia’s leading investment banks. But it also has an asset management arm, a wealth management arm and of course its rapidly growing retail banking arm, which offers personal banking and mortgages.

‍👉 What happened: Over the past few years, Macquarie’s retail bank has gone haaaard in the mortgage space and it’s paying off. According to APRA, Macquarie landed nearly 40% of all new lending in the month of July, which means their mortgage book grew 6.4 times faster than the Big 4 banks in July.

‍👉 What else: Interestingly, 95% of the loans won by Macquarie are being originated via mortgage brokers. And, clearly Macquarie is becoming a very significant threat to CommBank, NAB, Westpac and ANZ in mortgage-land - aka the banking cash cow.

‍What's the key learning?

‍💡Mortgages may seem boring compared to flashy investment banking, but they are one of the most lucrative parts of the financial system. And banks love offering home loans because they’re sticky, they’re long-term products and they give banks reliable income for decades.

💡In Australia, mortgage accounts are worth over $2.2 trillion, which is more than 60% of all bank lending. And right now, the big four (CBA, Westpac, NAB, ANZ) control around 70% of this market — their single biggest profit engine.

💡For CBA, which has a home loan book of around $600 billion, mortgages are the core driver of its $10.1 billion annual profit. And that’s why competition is fierce and Macquarie is leveraging an army of mortgage brokers to funnel all leads through its front door.