St.George Bank history

The NSW Permanent Building & Investment Society was established in 1939.

In 1945, StGeorge merged with the Cronulla District Co-operative Building Society and grew to 38 branches.

In 1955, the Society became a Permanent Building Society, which enabled its loans to be larger and terms shorter.

In 1972, StGeorge was the first building society to 'go on-line' with the installation of an IBM mainframe computer connected to 30 terminals.

In 1979, radio announcer John Laws almost caused a run on St George Building Society when he told his listeners "a big building society is going to go bust". St George kept its doors open and paid out every withdrawal.

The society became a bank in 1985 under the name Advance Bank.

In 1989 StGeorge established the Foundation as a registered charity with a commitment to enhancing the quality of life for Australia's children.

StGeorge achieved full banking status and acquired its banking licence in 1992.

In 1994, StGeorge led the market by launching electronic banking to business customers.

Advance Bank (and its BankSA subsidiary) was in turn taken over in 1997 by StGeorge Bank.

In 2002 the Bank announced a joint venture with Foodstuffs, New Zealand’s largest supermarket retailer, to establish Superbank.

As a leader in technology, StGeorge was the first bank to launch SMS Alerts in 2004.

By 2006 the Bank reached two major financial milestones: it achieved an after tax result of over $1billion for the first time and exceeded $100 billion in assets.

On 14 November 2007, Paul Fegan was announced as the new CEO of the StGeorge Bank, to replace Gail Kelly who had departed on 17 August 2007 to become CEO of Westpac.

StGeorge, and BankSA, became a subsidiary of Westpac on 1 December 2008.

On 1 March 2010, the Westpac Group commenced operating as a single authorised deposit-taking institution (ADI) and the legal entity StGeorge Bank Limited was de-registered.