MELBOURNE, Australia—Final bids for Australia & New Zealand Banking Group Ltd.'s vehicle finance unit are due by the end of the month, people familiar with the auction said, in a deal that will help the bank raise money to meet regulatory demands to hold additional capital.

A takeover offer from investment bank Macquarie Group Ltd. for ANZ's Esanda Dealer Finance, which has about 8.3 billion Australian dollars (US$6.1 billion) in lending assets, has been flagged by Australia's competition regulator for an informal review.

Other suitors include Carlyle Group, which has more than US$193 billion of assets under management, and Chinese conglomerate HNA Group Co., one of the two people said. A spokeswoman for Carlyle declined to comment, while HNA didn't immediately respond.

ANZ, one of Australia's biggest lenders, in May said it planned to send out an information memorandum to potential bidders. Chief Financial Officer Shayne Elliott this week said the process had gone through a second round after attracting a lot of interest domestically and internationally, and that the field of interested buyers had been narrowed down.

He said a sale was highly likely and would contribute toward the bank's efforts to increase capital.

The lender has said the Esanda business—which provides point-of-sale financing to customers of vehicle dealers, bailment and other wholesale finance, as well as financing under car manufacturers' brands—was no longer viewed as a core operation.

It said it would continue to provide asset finance to customers under the ANZ banner and that a sale won't include ANZ's commercial broker, commercial asset finance or direct-to-consumer asset finance businesses.

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission in a notice on its website said it would investigate a proposal from Macquarie's banking arm to buy Esanda and was seeking submissions on how it could potentially hurt competition. Macquarie's leasing business offers similar financing services and has finance arrangements with several car makers.

A spokeswoman for Macquarie declined to comment on the bank's bid.

The country's largest lenders will need to set aside billions of dollars more against potential home-loan losses after the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority this week said they needed to increase average mortgage risk weights—a measure of the capital needed as a buffer against the estimated risk of the loans—to at least 25% from next July, from 16% currently.

The regulator has said it wants to ensure the banks are "unquestionably strong," and is waiting on a broader review by the international Basel Committee on Banking Supervision before deciding whether to enforce an increase in banks' overall capital ratios.

ANZ's Mr. Elliott said other options to increase capital could include retaining earnings, through dividend-reinvestment plans and from the sale of some of the several stakes it has in banks in Asia, which he added would be attractive to a range of investors but could be complicated to exit.

Some of ANZ's rivals have already moved to increase capital. Westpac Banking Corp. has moved to reduce its controlling stake in BT Investment Management Ltd. and in May said it would raise about A$2 billion through a dividend reinvestment offer to shareholders, while National Australia Bank Ltd. said it is raising A$5.5 billion via a capital raising that would also smooth the way for it to exit its U.K. banking business later this year.

Write to Robb M. Stewart at robb.stewart@wsj.com

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