19th century In 1840,
Union Bank of Australia (UBA), a British bank with head office in London, agreed with the New Zealand Company to accompany settlers to New Zealand to provide them with banking services. UBA opened a branch in Petone, across the harbour from
Wellington, where it transferred the branch shortly thereafter. Between 1840 and 1847 the Union Bank issued its own bank notes for circulation in New Zealand. These were initially issued under British law until 1844 when the New Zealand Governor signed an ordinance allowing the Bank to issue bank notes but required that these be a minimum of 1 pound and redeemable at demand for gold or silver. In 1848, The Governor withdrew Union Bank's right to issue bank notes and transferred these rights to the
Colonial Bank of Issue (CBI). UBA notes in circulation were withdrawn and replaced with CBI bank notes. UBA objected, and every day it took whatever CBI notes it had received that day to the CBI and demanded redemption in gold; when UBA's customers wanted to withdraw money, the bank paid them in gold rather than CBI notes. This policy, when combined with previous confusion related to the issue of NZ Government debt, and support from the local commercial community, resulted in the CBI ultimately being shut down. The same year, UBA opened a branch in
Auckland, and a small number of branches elsewhere in the country followed. The following year, UBC resumed issuing bank notes in New Zealand under an act of the New Zealand Parliament. (
The Paper Currency Act 1856). In 1864,
Bank of Australasia, another London-based bank, opened branches in Auckland,
Dunedin and
Christchurch.
20th century In 1951, UBA and the Bank of Australasia merged to become the Australia and New Zealand Bank. In 1968, ANZ Bank joined
Databank Systems Limited consortium to provide joint data processing services. Two years later, ANZ Bank merged with a third London-based bank, the English, Scottish and Australian Bank, to form ANZ Banking Group. In 1976, ANZ moved its corporate headquarters to
Melbourne, Australia. In 1979, An Act of Parliament permitted ANZ to incorporate its branches in New Zealand as ANZ Banking Group (New Zealand) Ltd. ANZ sold 25% of the shares to the public. In 1983, ANZ opened its New Zealand head office in Wellington. In 1989, ANZ bought
PostBank (the Post Office Savings Bank) from the New Zealand government in a privatization. Two years earlier, the Government had separated the Post Office's banking business into a separate entity to prepare it for sale. In 1999, ANZ launched
internet banking.
21st century In 2002, ING and ANZ formed a joint venture under the ING brand The following year, ANZ bought
National Bank of New Zealand from
Lloyds TSB. In 2008, ANZ launched a mobile application. The same year, David Hisco replaces outgoing Jenny Fagg as CEO ANZ New Zealand. On 26 September 2012, ANZ National Bank CEO David Hisco announced that the National Bank would re-brand as "ANZ" by the end of October. The name of the company would change to "ANZ Bank New Zealand Limited". The technology of the two banks was brought together from 29 October 2012, with customers being able to use branches branded ANZ or the National Bank from the same date. Branches branded the National Bank would change to the ANZ branding before the bank's trademark license expired in 2014. In May 2019, the
Reserve Bank stripped ANZ of its accreditation to set and manage its capital reserves over persistent failures since 2014. In 2013, Onepath rebranded as ANZ Investments. In 2014, ANZ India got approval from
Reserve Bank of India to open two branches in India. In 2015, ANZ announced ANZ ETFS joint venture with
ETF Securities to offer 6 ETFs on ASX. In 2017, ANZ announced it would sell its online sharebroking service, Direct Broking, to investment bank, First NZ Capital (FNZC), for an undisclosed sum. The sale was completed in December 2018. In 2019, Antonia Watson replaced David Hisco as CEO of ANZ NZ. In 2020, ANZ sold
UDC Finance for $794 million to
SBI Shinsei Bank. ==Organisational structure==