“I’m really optimistic about the future,” she said. “The rhetoric around small businesses has been negative for too long. When I look at small businesses, I see passion, drive, resilience, grit. This is the story we want to bring out.”
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Small businesses had built up cash buffers during the lockdown periods and were now looking to invest to grow. Morgan said demand for lending would not be reduced by rising rates, which she said remained “relatively low”.
“There’s still a huge incentive to borrow and invest,” she said. “I don’t think the cost of debt is a barrier for many small businesses,” she said, adding there had been “huge growth” in demand for asset and equipment finance.
CBA has made a push into the small business lending market in recent years, clawing market share from the National Australia Bank which remains the country’s dominant business lender.
Morgan said CBA was focused on using analytics from the bank’s enormous data pool, including customer transaction patterns and merchant terminal payments, to help businesses observe patterns and make tweaks to operations to increase cash flow.
Morgan said she did not focus on what competitors were offering, but pointed to CBA’s digital business tools to assist with functions such as payroll and rostering. “The biggest thing about small businesses is they’re time poor,” she said. “If you don’t offer great digital tools, great data and insights, you won’t be relevant.”
Both major parties have pledged to rebuild domestic manufacturing. Morgan said there was huge potential for Australian manufacturing, particularly in mining and agricultural products, and the banks could play a role through innovative financing.
She said traditional forms of finance had not met the needs of manufacturers, and CBA was promoting loans such as invoice and inventory financing. “Manufacturing is one of our target industries for growth.”
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