An Evaluation of Privatisations in Australian Banking and Insurance

In the 1990s Australian governments, both federal and state, committed themselves to a policy of microeconomic reform of which privatisation of key government assets was a major component. Government owned banks and insurance offices were amongst the first institutions to be sold off. The results of this policy have been both complex and in cases unforeseen. Few of these privatised financial firms are in existence today. An information cost framework is used to evaluate the experience of privatised banks and insurers. This approach points to a dynamic process of organisational change within the financial sector that has influenced the outcome of the privatisation process in the financial sector.