Today The Daily Telegraph ripped into bankers for having a day off, while the rest of the workforce (employees and business owners) had to keep their nose to the grindstone. In an age of falling productivity and the rising cost of living, the Tele branded those enjoying a day off a “a bunch of lazy bankers!”.

This is a bit harsh when most employees must take this legal holiday that has existed for close to 150 years. And while politicians and small business owners are critical of this anachronistic break from work for bankers, the NSW Industrial Relations Minister Sophie Cotsis says the Minns Government has no plans to kill this banker’s day off.

The Tele rips into the big four banks generally for booking a combined profit of $16 billion. A big chunk of that has come from the 12 interest rate rises, courtesy of the RBA, so the banks have been beneficiaries of the central bank’s goal to kill inflation.

And while bagging bankers is a national sport, which was captured in the old St George TV commercial that showed a BBQ party stunned into shocked silence when a party goer admitted to another party attendee that he was a banker! But things totally brightened up and smiles returned to everyone’s faces when the banker said: “I’m with St George!”

Bank holidays aren’t really a big issue but service to the customer is, and banks need to up their customer care, especially in an age when interest rate rises are hurting lots of Australians’ disposable income and mortgage stress is going through the roof.

Banks recently increased fixed rates. There has been an historical pattern where banks would increase fixed rates when customers were panicking about rising rates, but this often happened when rate rises were nearly over. Rate cuts are expected within a year, at the latest, so anyone thinking about fixing their interest rate shouldn’t do it for too long.

Lots of people ‘hate’ banks generally but the disdain rises as interest rates are spiking. Over the years I’ve always advised that if you want to get even with a money-taking bank, just buy their shares and become an owner.

When they’re ‘screwing’ customers, they’re rewarding their shareholders.

When term deposit interest rates were 1%, bank dividends were better than 5% and were even higher with franking credits adding 1-2% more returns, depending on your tax rate.

Look at the chart for CBA since 1998, where the share price has gone from $20 to $101 today.

That’s a return of 400% (or 16% a year), and that doesn’t add in the dividends for 25 years as well! The chart above shows that buying CBA shares when there’s been a big sell off has been a smart play. That’s something to remember the next time the stock market goes into panic mode.

Warren Buffett once told us to be “greedy when others are fearful” and that’s the best time to buy shares in a greedy bank!

If you don’t want to buy one bank, you can always investigate buying the top 200 companies on the stock market via an exchange traded fund (ETF), which can give you these stocks in one trade. You can consider buying A200, IOZ or STW for the top 200 companies or VAS for the top 300.

Since November 2008, the price of STW has gone from $32 to $66, which is a gain of 106% before dividends of around 4% a year plus franking credits.

This has been an easy way to pocket about 12% p.a., over 15 years and the financial sector in the past has been as much as 30% of the ASX 200 top companies. This means an ETF is another way to benefit from banks while having more diversification to other companies as well.

Banks can play hardball with their customers, but customers can strike back by becoming shareholders!