ANZ issued a statement yesterday confirming speculation that it is talking to private equity firm Kohlberg Kravis Roberts about buying the accounting and business management software company MYOB.

ANZ said it has not reached any agreement with KKR and there is no certainty it will make the acquisition.

KKR has owned MYOB since 2019, when it paid A$2 billion for the business. Bloomberg reported that KKR has put a $4 billion price tag on the company.

For ANZ, MYOB would be an embedded finance play – putting its lending and payments processing services onto the MYOB platform.

MYOB has already moved in this direction. In April, it announced that it is working with invoice finance company Butn and commercial finance broker Valiant to develop a Loans and Finance Hub, promising fast turnaround on finance applications.

ANZ could work alongside Butn and Valiant, or replace them.

In September last year, MYOB launched a direct debit service to allow business customers to manage recurring payments.

Founded in 1991, MYOB claims to have more than one million SME customers and more than 100,000 accounting professionals in Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, Malaysia and other Asian markets.