By Alice Uribe

SYDNEY--National Australia Bank Ltd. Chief Executive Ross McEwan said there would be little benefit from interest rates going negative, arguing that there are other levers that can be pulled to help stimulate the economy.

The boss of one Australia's Big Four banks told a Bloomberg-hosted conference on Monday that he expected interest rates "to be low for a really long period of time," adding he wasn't convinced the country needed to go any lower than the current setting of 0.25%.

"I think the government has done a very good job of stimulating [the economy] to keep things moving along while we go through this crisis," he said. "I don't think governments can continue forever to do that, but I think there is a path that they can look after industries that have been badly damaged…I would expect to see some of those industries with some form of support for a longer period of time."

Mr. McEwan said it was clear the Australian banking industry would be less profitable in the short-to-medium term, but in the long term, the strength of the national economy would place the sector in good stead.

Still, he was uncertain whether there would be a V, U or W-shaped recovery in Australia. "Having experienced a second wave of increase of the virus, it feels more like a W... I think it's uncertain," said Mr. McEwan, a former boss of Royal Bank of Scotland who has been credited with the British lender's turnaround.

He said it could be three years before the Australian economy will be "back into GDP growth equal or greater than where we finished in 2019."

Mr. McEwan said the Covid-19 crisis has also likely speeded up innovation, evidenced by a drop of as much as 30% in the use of cash.

"This crisis, I think, will create some opportunities. I think it's brought forward many of the trends that you may have thought may have taken 10 years, and are on us right now," he said. "For example in the last 14 weeks the use of cash has dropped off dramatically, the use of checks has dropped off dramatically, the use of ATMs has dropped off. These trends would have probably have taken another five to 10 years to have emerged." 



  Write to Alice Uribe at alice.uribe@wsj.com