"How banks can win our trust back (and it's not through good deeds)", 24 August 2017

Last week the Commonwealth Bank released its corporate responsibility report, chock-full of good deeds...

The report claims to represent the bank's heart and soul. "Trust," it declares, "is critical to our business and we work hard to deliver value, not just to our customers and shareholders but also to the communities that we are a part of."

Yet this sentiment sits awkwardly with the bank still reeling from revelations of multiple breaches of money-laundering laws and the systematic overcharging of many of its poorest customers. And these are just the latest in a long list of misconduct charges made against the Commonwealth Bank and other Australian banks...

Trust in the financial sector in Australia and elsewhere has plummeted...

How come big banks find themselves in this two-faced bind? They are delivering apparently genuine expressions of social conscience, while at the same time maintaining such dreadful records of anti-social behaviour...

The simple answer is that a social conscience is not the core business of banking...

[also refers to JP Morgan Chase and HSBC]