Battles take a toll

There was a time when you couldn’t get an Australian investor to listen to an argument to reduce their holdings in the big banks. “They’ve been my best performers – there’s no way I’m selling”, “We love the dividends” and “I don’t want to pay the capital gains tax” were the superficially persuasive rebuttals.

Slowly, times are changing. Prompted by the Hayne royal commission and its revelations of the rotten, greedy, profit-at-all-costs culture inside the big banks, many investors are now questioning their default beliefs. Unfortunately, attitudes are not changing quickly enough.

After 20 years of generally rising bank share prices, there remain