Macquarie takes its origins from the merchant bank Hill Samuel Australia (HSA), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hill Samuel & Co. Limited, London.  Established in Australia in 1969, it began operations in Sydney in January 1970 with only three staff.

Macquarie takes its name from Australia's most successful governor, Governor Lachlan Macquarie (1761-1824), who was instrumental in the establishment of Australia's first bank and was also responsible for introducing Australia's first coinage, the 'Holey Dollar'.

In 1813, Governor Macquarie overcame an acute currency shortage by purchasing Spanish silver dollars, punching out the centres and creating two new coins, the 'Holey Dollar' and the 'Dump'. This doubled the number of coins in circulation, increased their combined value by 25 percent and prevented the coins from leaving the colony.

Today, Macquarie Group is a global provider of banking, financial, advisory, investment and funds management services.

1969
Established as Hill Samuel Australia Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of UK merchant bank Hill Samuel & Co Ltd
1985
Obtained an Australian banking licence as Macquarie Bank Limited
1988
Acquired Chemical Australia Ltd (Australia)
1989
London office opened
1990
Acquired Boston Australia Ltd (Australia)
1992
Acquired Security Pacific (Australia)
1994
New York office opened
1995
Hong Kong office opened
1996
Macquarie Bank Limited publicly listed on the Australian Stock Exchange
1999
Acquired the Australian assets of Bankers' Trust
2004
Acquired Asian cash equities business of ING Group (Asia)
2007
Acquired Giuliani Capital Advisors LLC (US)
2007
Formally established Macquarie Group Limited as a Non-Operating Holding company
2008
Established a UK bank on 4 February
Acquired Orion Financial Inc. (Canada)
Acquired CIT Systems Leasing (US)
2009
Acquired Constellation Energy's downstream natural gas trading operations (North America)
2010
Macqarie Infrastructure Fund launched Acquired Sal. Oppenheim's equity derivatives and cash equities business (Germany)