“In our view, the major banks did not deliver the material upgrades to earnings, dividend or buyback expectations necessary to support current multiples,” he said, noting CBA’s dividend yield had fallen below the Reserve Bank’s cash rate for the first time since the global financial crisis.

Novus Capital senior client adviser Gary Glover said it was “hard to fathom” why people were continuing to buy shares in CBA, especially given its low yield and consensus expectations for earnings to remain flat over the next year.

However, despite bank share prices sitting “way beyond” broker targets, he said there was also a tendency for market leaders to rally during a bull market. “When money takes off, it tends to go to market leaders,” he said.

Citi analyst Brendan Sproules noted the country’s biggest bank, CBA, was growing more slowly than other banks. While CBA is trading at the biggest premium to its forecast earnings, Sproules said the bank was growing at a weaker rate. Of 16 analysts covering CBA on Bloomberg, there are no buy ratings on CBA shares.

“In mortgages, it continues to grow below system,” Sproules said. “In business lending, it seems to be doing even worse and registering not even half of its peers’ growth. Furthermore, it is losing market share to Macquarie, which has recently announced its ambitious business banking strategy.”

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In the six months to January, CBA grew its business lending portfolio by 3.7 per cent compared with the other major banks which grew at about 8 per cent, and Macquarie which grew at 10 to 15 per cent over the same period.

Sproules noted CBA was also underperforming in household deposits, which has been a historical area of strength for the bank.

Jefferies equity analyst Matthew Wilson said in a recent note that CBA’s valuation looked unsustainable and that its share price rally was likely partly attributable to an inflow of funds from passive investors.

“We think large swathes of passive money (also avoiding China) has distorted the fundamentals,” he said, noting the impact of passive investing, such as index funds and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), tended to have a disproportionate effect on the market and sector-leading companies.