How have listed financials performed?
There have been mixed results for major listed financial groups in terms of volatility caused by COVID-19 with banks suffering least while firms such as OneVue and Challenger report losses of more than 60%.
The big four banks all suffered declines between 30% and 43% since the start of the year to 23 March but this was less than many other troubled sectors. However, in the short term, they have been hit hard in the past few days with the firms reporting daily falls of around 8%-10%.
Commonwealth Bank was the ‘best’ big four bank with losses of 30% followed by Westpac at 41%, ANZ at 42% and National Australian Bank (NAB) at 43%.
Joining CBA with a 30% fall was small-cap stock Centrepoint Alliance, a company that develops and supports financial advisers via four divisions; licensee solutions, financial advice, learning solutions and investment solutions.
At the other end of the spectrum, superannuation platform provider OneVue was the worst-performing financial with share price falls of 69%. Last month, the firm reported a $27 million loss as a result of its Sargon transaction.
Another poor performer was Challenger which fell 62%, it recently announced it had been planning a restructure of its business to have more focus on direct engagement with propective clients and increased support for advisers.
Finally, IOOF lost 60% as it had been dented from a reduction in wealth management income while fund flows were affected by market volatility. It was also subject to a second shareholder class action suit from Shine Corporate and had been named by UBS as stock at risk of further underperformance.
Sitting in the middle was Perpetual which lost 45% and Macquarie which lost 47%.
Share price performance of big four banks v ASX 200 from start of 2020 to 23 March 2020
Share price performance of major financials v ASX 200 since start of 2020 to 23 March 2020
AUTHOR
Laura Dew
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