By Scott Murdoch
SYDNEY, July 23 (Reuters) – Australia’s top investment bank Macquarie Group said on Thursday Chief Executive Shemara Wikramanayake will retire this year and be replaced by Greg Ward, one of the bank’s longest-serving executives.
Wikramanayake, 64, will leave on November 6, the bank said.
In her nearly eight years at the helm, Wikramanayake reshaped Macquarie to focus on asset management and infrastructure investment to make it less reliant on volatile investment banking fees, and its shares more than doubled in value.
Macquarie Chair Glenn Stevens said both Wikramanayake and her successor Ward, who was chief financial officer during the global financial crisis, had deftly handled unpredictable challenges such as the pandemic and war in parts of the world.
“There’ll always be things we might not be able to predict and what we need is agility and decisiveness to deal with those. Shemara has shown that in an exemplary fashion, and Greg has shown that in all stages of his career,” Chair Glenn Stevens told reporters on a call Thursday.
Stevens said the bank’s board did not look outside of Macquarie to find the next chief executive. Ward’s appointment was signed off on Wednesday night.
Macquarie shares rose 0.4% in early trading on Thursday while the S&P/ASX 200 was up 0.95%.
Wikramanayake is one of Australia’s best paid company bosses and most high-profile female chief executives.
She was paid A$26.5 million in 2025, reinforcing Macquarie’s reputation in Australia as the “Millionaire’s Factory” as the bank’s remuneration policy is closely aligned to executive performance.
Macquarie did not release details of Ward’s pay package as CEO on Thursday.
Macquarie’s shares have climbed from A$124.93 in mid-2018 when her appointment was announced to A$254.93 as of Wednesday’s close, outperforming a more than 40% rise in the S&P/ASX 200 index over the same period.
WARD LED BANK’S RETAIL PUSH
Ward, 58, is a 30-year veteran of Macquarie and most recently headed up Macquarie’s retail banking business which has made a concerted push to erode the market share of Australia’s big four banks in mortgages and retail deposits.
“All of the businesses are showing wonderful growth over the long term and certainly have under Shemara’s tenure. I think we’re tremendously well positioned across the entire platform,” Ward said.
“There’s always market events and geopolitical events, and we run a very conservative balance sheet, and I think we’re well equipped to handle any of those challenges.”
Macquarie is now Australia’s fifth-largest mortgage lender, and analysts have forecast it could break into the top four in the next few years.
Stevens, a former Reserve Bank of Australia governor, is due to retire next year and said succession planning was underway to find his replacement.
“I think we will be in good shape, and I believe there are people on the board who are more than capable of doing the role,” he said.
In a first-quarter trading update released on Thursday, Macquarie said its Commodities and Global Markets division’s net profit contribution had grown substantially, driven by increased income from commodities trading.
The bank does not release quarterly profit figures. Macquarie will hold its annual general meeting in Sydney on Thursday.
(Reporting by Scott Murdoch in Sydney and Sneha Kumar, Nikita Maria Jino and Shivangi Lahiri in Bengaluru; Editing by Pooja Desai and Sonali Paul)
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