How it started
History and development
The company started in 1858 as a fixed-term (terminating) building society to improve conditions in the Bendigo goldfields during the Victorian gold rush.
At seven years old, in 1865, the company restructured, taking the name Bendigo Mutual Permanent Land and Building Society, which incorporated in Victoria 11 years afterwards. It continued to expand its holdings when, in 1978, it merged with Bendigo and Eaglehawk Star, a building society established in 1901.
Further growth involved the acquisition of the building societies Sandhurst, in 1983, and Sunraysia, in 1985, a merger with Sandhurst Trustees Ltd and the acquisition of Capital and Compass building societies.
In 1982 BBS became the first financial institution in Australia to introduce successfully both Visa credit and debit cards.
1993 saw BBS receive a stockmarket listing. Its growth continued throughout the 90s when it acquired National Mortgage Market Corporation Limited in 1995, a mortgage-manager company focussed on loan introducers and brokers. In that year BBS converted to a bank with the name Bendigo Bank. In 1997, Bendigo Bank acquired Monte Paschi Australia from Banca Monte dei Paschi di Siena, an Italian banking group, for AU$42.255M. Monte Paschi Australia was renamed Cassa Commerciale Australia in the same year.
From Wikipedia’s article on Bendigo Bank, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.2