HSBC Holdings PLC yesterday vowed to accelerate its Asia pivot, despite spiraling tensions between China and the West after it reported a 30 percent plunge in profits for last year caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Reported profit after tax came in at US$6.1 billion, which the bank blamed primarily on higher-than-expected credit losses and other bad debts.
The results came as HSBC published a new strategy laying out plans to redouble its attempt to seize more of the Asian market — the region of the world where Europe’s largest lender makes the vast majority of its profits.
Photo: Tyrone Siu, Reuters
The strategy would see the London-headquartered lender plough about US$6 billion into shoring up operations across Asia, with a particular focus on targeting wealth management in the increasingly affluent region.
The bank made specific mention of markets in Southeast Asia, such as Singapore, as well as China and Hong Kong, and also the Middle East.
“We plan to focus on and invest in the areas in which we are strongest,” HSBC chief executive officer Noel Quinn said in a statement.
The global economic slowdown caused by the virus has hit financial giants hard, but HSBC has a further headache — its politically precarious position as a major business conduit between China and the West.
HSBC makes 90 percent of its profit in Asia, with China and Hong Kong the major drivers of growth.
As a result, it has found itself more vulnerable than most to the increasingly frayed relationship between China and Western powers — especially after Beijing imposed a draconian security law on Hong Kong last year and cracked down on democracy supporters.
HSBC vocally endorsed the National Security Law, a move that led to criticism from lawmakers in the UK and the US.
It has frozen the bank accounts of some Hong Kong democracy advocates, with Quinn summoned to testify before British lawmakers earlier this month.
At the same time HSBC has found itself called out by Chinese state media for providing information that helped lead to the arrest in Canada of Huawei Technologies Co (華為) chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou (孟晚舟).
HSBC said it has to obey the laws in each jurisdiction it operates in.
However, the dual crises neatly encapsulated the delicate position that a bank so reliant on China has found itself in.
“The geopolitical environment remains challenging — in particular for a global bank like HSBC — and we continue to be mindful of the potential impact that it could have on our strategy,” chairman Malcolm Tucker said in a statement attached to yesterday’s results.
Despite those complications, HSBC looks set to go all in on Hong Kong.
According to Bloomberg and the Financial Times, the bank is planning to move three of its top executives from London to Hong Kong in the coming months. The trio collectively head up wealth and personal banking, global banking and markets, and global commercial banking.
The latest strategy comes just 12 months after HSBC announced a worldwide overhaul to slash 35,000 jobs by next year, primarily in its less profitable European and US divisions. The job cuts represent about 15 percent of the bank’s global workforce.
HSBC has spent a year in vain looking to sell its French retail arm and the Financial Times yesterday reported that it was also planning to end its consumer banking business in the US.
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