HSBC's Split Personality Is Dragging It Down
Having to serve different geopolitical masters is as much a threat as swelling Covid-related loan losses.
Two faces of HSBC.
Photographer: Matt Cardy/Getty Images
HSBC Holdings Plc can’t seem to get a break. Even the financial-market boom that buoyed profits at some banks wasn’t enough to save Europe’s biggest lender from missing estimates. Chief Executive Officer Noel Quinn said HSBC is looking at accelerating restructuring plans that are expected to lead to the loss of 35,000 jobs. He may need to think even more radically.
The bank reported second-quarter adjusted pretax profit fell 57% from a year earlier to $2.59 billion, versus an estimate of $2.94 billion. HSBC lifted its projection for loan losses to between $8 billion and $13 billion for this year, as it contends with the economic impact of the Covid pandemic. The shares fell as much as 4.7% in Hong Kong trading, reaching their lowest since the depths of the global financial crisis in 2009.