Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd. reclassified its mortgage data to show that loans to investors are 37 per cent higher than previously reported, according to an article in Bloomberg. Home loans to landlords totaled A$82.5 billion ($60 billion) as of May 31, ANZ said in a regulatory filing Friday. That compared with the A$60.4 billion previously reported, according to Australian Prudential Regulation Authority data. Owner-occupier mortgages totaled A$129.8 billion, down from A$147.3 billion, according to the data. The reclassification only relates to data ANZ provided to regulatory agencies for statistical publications, the Melbourne-based bank said. The changes don’t affect the company’s total lending and deposit balances, risk-weighted assets, regulatory capital, prior financial reports or customers, it said. “The restatement is probably cosmetic,” said Simon Burge, who oversees A$450 million including ANZ shares as chief investment officer at Above the Index Asset Management Pty in Sydney. “It’s way of conveying to the regulators and shareholders that the bank takes these classifications seriously and reviews them regularly.” After a week-long delay, Westpac Banking Corp has lifted its standard variable interest rate for investment property borrowers by 0.27 percentage points to 5.75 per cent, according to an article in the Sydney Morning Herald. As the last of the Big Four moved its investor interest rates higher in response to regulatory action, data released recently showed investor lending growing by a larger amount than initially thought with the Reserve Bank of Australia revising up previously reported figures. Westpac's consumer bank chief executive, George Frazis, said the higher investor rates "is an important step in ensuring that Westpac meets APRA's benchmark that investor credit growth should be no more than 10 per cent". Westpac has been growing above the cap. In a statement on Friday afternoon, Westpac also said its fixed rates on residential investment property loans would rise by "up to" 0.30 percentage points from August 4, while fixed rates on owner-occupier home loans would fall by "up to"' 0.30 percentage points, also from August 4. ING Direct is the latest lender to announce policy changes to dampen investor growth, although the non-major says it will not be touching existing variable rate loans on investment properties. According to communication sent to brokers, effective from today, Friday 31 July, interest rates based on LVRs will no longer apply for investment property loans. In June, ING Direct announced rate increases for investment loans above 80 per cent LVR, on its variable rate Mortgage Simplifier and Orange Advantage products. The new rates were advertised at 4.84 per cent for the Orange Advantage investment loan and 4.72 per cent for the Mortgage Simplifier investment loan. The announcement today means that all investment loans, including those under 80 per cent LVR, will be subject to those increased rates. However, the non-major lender said variable interest rates will not change for existing investment borrowers.
ANZ has informed the Australian regulators that it has reclassified its mortgage data to show that loans to investors are 37%, higher than previously reported. The bank said in a statement on Friday morning that it had "updated our historical data" and was now reporting only mortgages made by investors.