Equity Markets Group

04 August 2005

The Head of Macquarie Bank’s Equity Markets Group (EMG), Mr Ottmar Weiss, today announced his retirement from the Bank.

Mr Weiss will step down on 30 September, 2005, but will remain available to the Bank on a part-time consultancy basis.

Mr Kim Burke, who most recently led EMG’s highly successful Asian businesses, will succeed Mr Weiss as Group Head and Executive Committee member.

Mr Weiss said he wanted to spend more time with his young family.

Mr Weiss’ career at Macquarie has spanned some twenty years, the last twelve as an Executive Director of the Bank. He has been the Group Head of EMG for the past five years and prior to that, held a similar Division Head role in Equity Structured Products.

Mr Weiss said the continued prosperity of the EMG business and the present depth of senior management talent made this an excellent time to facilitate a handover to Mr Burke.

“Having driven a sustained period of rapid international growth and success in the EMG business portfolio, I feel this is an appropriate time to reorganise our senior management in order to fully engage them in the next series of major growth initiatives.”

“I have immensely enjoyed my time at Macquarie and look forward to maintaining an ongoing association with the Bank. I would particularly like to thank all my colleagues for their tremendous support and contributions over the years, “ Mr Weiss said.

Macquarie Bank Managing Director and CEO, Mr Allan Moss said that Mr Weiss had shown himself to be an excellent and accomplished leader of the  EMG business, and was also a respected and valued contributor to Macquarie’s senior management team.

He said that under Mr Weiss’ leadership, EMG had developed into a significant business for Macquarie, and that the Group had experienced outstanding international growth, particularly over the past three years. His reputation for identifying talented and entrepreneurial individuals and engendering strong loyalty within his team have been notable features of his leadership style over the years.

Mr Moss said he and Mr Weiss’ colleagues were sad to see him depart, and would miss his strong contribution to the leadership team. However, they understood his reasons for doing so and were confident of a smooth transition of responsibilities to Mr Burke.

Mr Moss said that Mr Burke was very well qualified to lead the Equity Markets Group because of his great success in leading the Group’s businesses in South Africa and in Asia (see attached brief resume).

Mr Moss said the Bank continued to have a very experienced 12-member Executive Committee.  The average tenure at the Bank of the other Executive Committee members was more than 19 years.

For further information, please contact:

Matthew Russell
Public Relations
Macquarie Bank Limited
Tel: (612) 8232 4102
Mobile: (614) 1069 9532

Jenny Kovacs
Investor Relations
Macquarie Bank Limited
Tel: (612) 8232 3250
Mobile: (614) 1354 6547