The wealth management brands of Westpac and St George will be retained in the long-term should the lenders merge, Westpac chief executive Gail Kelly has said.
"Within the wealth space, absolutely we will be retaining Asgard and Securitor as very well-known brand names, being their third-party distribution, so there is no reason to suggest anything other than to keep those brands," Kelly said.
Other brands, including Westpac Financial Planning, BT Financial Group and St George Financial Planning, would also be kept, Kelly said.
She said BT was well-positioned to merge with Asgard.
"[BT] is a strong business. It is well-positioned for when equity markets turn around and improve and... it is well-positioned too for the merger with St George if that occurs, in terms of putting together the Asgard business with the BT business," she said.
It was too early to discuss a merger specifically between BT Wrap and Asgard eWrap, due to their different market positions, she said.
"It [Asgard] is much more of a fully-fledged platform, not with all the bells and whistles, to all the planners out there with an end-to-end value proposition including the front-end planning tools.
"So it is a practice management approach within Asgard."
There would be increased team collaboration, higher customer focus and a make it happen culture for both businesses, should they merge, Kelly said.
