Assets of Financial Institutions

This statistical table brings together aggregate data for banks, credit unions, building societies, corporations covered by the Financial Sector (Collection of Data) Act 2001 (known as Registered Financial Corporations (RFCs)) and other significant parts of the financial sector for which aggregate data are published by the RBA, the ABS and APRA.

Care should be exercised in drawing conclusions about relative sizes and rates of growth of institutions because of the different nature of their activities and different coverage of the various data collections. Coverage differences include: timing (e.g. most bank data are monthly averages until June 2000 and end-month thereafter); valuation; location (e.g. life office data before 1988 only covers assets in Australia, most other collections include overseas assets); and netting out of transactions within some groups. Coverage of some series changes over time: in recent years aggregates for individual groups have been significantly affected by conversion of non-banks to banks, reclassification between RFC categories and changes to reporting forms. Some further details of coverage can be obtained from statistical files dealing with the relevant institutions.

aReserve Bank (RBA)a data for June 1996 adjusted for change in accounting policy.

aBanks (other than RBA)a: up to 1985 inclusive refers to A$ assets in Australia only. From 1989 equals the totals shown in statistical table B2.

aOther authorised deposit-taking institutionsa excludes some ADIs, including SCCIs. Data from December 1999 inclusive are drawn from APRAas quarterly return. These data will differ from the total assets figures presented in statistical tables B7 and B8 because they include assets of all building societies and credit unions, whereas statistical tables B7 and B8 only include data for building societies and credit unions with total assets greater than or equal to $50 million.

From December 1999 data, aRFCsa cover registered corporations whose assets in Australia (including related corporations) exceed $50 million. Prior to December 1999, this threshold was set at $5 million. In April 2003, responsibility for the collection of financial statistics from RFCs was transferred from the RB to APRA. Prior to April 2003, these data were collected by the RB under the now repealed Financial Corporations Act 1974. These changes have resulted in breaks in all series covering RFCs at April 2003. aFinance companies and general financiersa includes corporations formerly registered as Category E (Pastoral Finance Companies), F (Finance Companies) and G (General Financiers) under the Financial Corporations Act 1974.

The assets of life offices and superannuation funds and other managed funds have been consolidated by the ABS. As a result, these data should not be compared to statistical tables B14aB18, which contain unconsolidated data.

aGeneral insurance officesa include both private and public sector offices. Data are sourced from the ABS Financial Accounts and relate to financial assets only.

aSecuritisation vehiclesa (commonly referred to as issuers of asset-backed securities) are special purpose vehicles set up to securitise selected assets, including residential mortgages. Many of the securities issued by these vehicles are held by other institutions shown in the table. More detailed data are shown in statistical table B19.