Almost half of the Australian group’s record profit came from the Americas this year. Will Macquarie still call Australia home?

Macquarie has emerged from the pandemic cashed-up and ready to spend.

Australia is not the first country that comes to mind with regards to climate action. But away from the political rhetoric, the exceptionally powerful superannuation funds and corporates are pushing change. The key is an acceptance that in Australia it’s all about transition.

The Australian financial services company has announced a profit guidance upgrade prompted by a win from its commodities business thanks to the crisis in Texas. It’s a bad look, but it illustrates both a complex and flawed market, and a bank with a great eye for a niche.

Just like the global financial crisis, Australia is emerging from Covid-19 more strongly than the rest of the developed world. Investment banks here have never been busier, raising huge sums of equity from one of the world’s largest asset pools. In the first of a two-part series on Australian investment banking, we look at the work that came out of a global pandemic.

No developed market in the world has blue-chip banks paying higher dividends than those in Australia. It’s implausible to continue doing so during the coronavirus crisis – but banks fear a backlash from the income-loving retirees and retail folk who make up half their investor base.

The announcement on Thursday that Shemara Wikramanayake will replace Nicholas Moore as CEO of Macquarie Group in November is significant for two reasons.

Policy bank money is fine, to a point, but if China really wants an infrastructure plan to change the world, it is going to need private sector money to join the party. It is going to need names like Macquarie, historically thought of as an investment bank (which it still is), but today also one of the world’s largest infrastructure investors.

As he approaches 10 years at the helm, Macquarie CEO Nicholas Moore runs a business quite different from the one he inherited during the financial crisis. Capital market risk has been replaced with steady annuity-style income – but he says innovation and individuality has survived the transition.