The law of unintended consequences...

Wikipedia defines the law, popularised by American sociologist Merton as follows:

that an intervention in a complex system tends to create unanticipated and often undesirable outcomes..(here)

This is being seen in Australia.  Deutsche Bank's efforts to assist Sri Lankans affected by the 2004 Tsunami have resulted in firm-branded boats entering Australian waters carrying the 'Lankans seeking refugee status (only for the boat and occupants to be detained upon reaching Australia) (here).  Similarly and more expectedly, the boom in commodities and in particular the labour costs for Ozzie workers and new infrastructure costs are crippling big Ozzie projects, including the offshore Browse LNG field:

....Yet mothballing four years of work implies Australia has become too expensive a destination for big greenfield development. The industry will be watching what happens next with interest because many of the biggest projects are almost as costly. ...Analysts previously estimated that floating LNG could take $9bn off the $40bn-plus cost of Browse. Nice.. (here)

Unprofitable projects means asset sales:

...THE list of assets Rio Tinto is seeking to sell keeps getting longer. So does the list of banks getting a slice of Rio Tinto's business....Investment banks ranging from the best-known names on Wall Street to small Australian boutiques are on the roster as Rio Tinto, under new leadership, embarks on a program to sell off assets. (here).

and declining industries:

...Contraction of the industry has been blamed on the strength of the Australian dollar and fierce competition from overseas rivals who enjoy lower costs on wages, power and raw materials. Some manufacturers have called for industry to get access to cheap gas by government decree, but large resources companies such as Santos and BHP have fought such a market intervention....Mr Nasser said as recently as two years ago he was confident the car industry could survive in Australia, but had become more pessimistic since then. (here)

Cost of funding - cheap and risky?

More on Oz banks' low cost of funding - it's due to nice instruments called covered bonds, invented in the former European state of Prussia in the 18th Centure and rolled out globally in the 2007-8 financial crisis:

....Now the evidence is in. Covered bonds have brought down bank costs even further. In a confidential note to its institutional clients, Westpac describes the fall in wholesale funding costs over the past year as ''extraordinary''.....No longer can the banks rely on that hoary old chestnut of ''high funding costs'' to pass off their failure to match the successive cuts in the official cash rate....Margins are fatter than ever, veritably bulging, and there is scant proof that borrowers are getting their grimy fingers on a single cent of it. It's a good thing for shareholders though, some cautious at the listless growth in credit....(here).

But like all good things in banking, risks are appearing...

....BlackRock Inc. said using loans to small- and medium-sized companies, or SMEs, to back the securities rather than safer real estate or public-sector debt may devalue the asset class. Pacific Investment Management Co. said the first European deal, being marketed now by Commerzbank AG, may call into question SME issues as true covered bonds if it fails to qualify for indexes benchmarking performance....(here)