Co-operative Building Society of South Australia grows to be state's biggest home lending pillar from 1900
Co-operative Building Society of South Australia founder and chairman Alwin Fischer pictured seated at right (top middle) in 1912 with other directors A.R. Burnell and W.P. Ponder (standing) and H. Adams and C.E, Taplin (seated). Bottom middle: A.R. Burnell (centre), with society's assets reaching £1 million, being farewelled in 1953, by (from left) state labor opposition leader Michael O'Halloran, premierTom Playford, Adelaide lord mayor L.M. Hargraces and society director P.W.E. Culley. The Co-op's original building (at left) in King William Street, Adelaide city (next to the Napoleon Hotel, later demolished) was pulled down in 1976 to make way for its 15-storey offices at right.
Images courtesy State Library of South Australia
The Co-operative Building Society of South Australia became a pillar of low-cost home lending in the state during the 20th Century before becoming the Adelaide Bank in 1994 and entering a merger as the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank in 2007.
The Co-operative was founded by German-born North Adelaide businessman Alwin Fischer and incorporated in 1900 according to the 1843 non-profit scheme of Thomas Bowkett, a London surgeon and progressive thinker, to enable the less well-off to become landholders. Concerns over certain practices led United Kingdom government to ban the societies but they spread they became a popular in Australia hrough to the early-mid 20th century for a growing middle class wanted to afford their own homes.
The Co-operative Building Society of South Australia became a prominent state icon and, by 1990, its asset based passed the $1 billion mark. In 1992, the Co-operative took over South Australia’s oldest building society, the REI, and merged with the Hindmarsh Building Society from 1877. The stronger Co-operative kept the name in the merger that formed the biggest building society in Australia after St George’s. The merger also aimed to lift the combined housing lending market share of the co-operative and Hindmarsh from 20% to 40%. Co-operative Building Society managing director Barry Fitzpatrick said new federal laws’ stricter guidelines on capital adequacy for building societies put pressure on the industry to rationalise.
On January 1, 1994, the Co-operative Building Society of South Australia Limited name disappeared when it became the publicly listed Adelaide Bank (as distinct from the Bank of Adelaide that collapsed in the 1970s and was taken over by ANZ Bank).
In 2007, Adelaide Bank merged with the expanding Bendigo Bank as the Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, a top 100 ASX listed company, with more than 110,000 shareholders. The Bendigo name was used for retail banking but Adelaide Bank remained an entity as a mortgage broker.
