Sat, Dec 03, 2022 page10

• HSBC to axe at least 200 senior operations managers

  • Reuters, HONG KONG and LONDON
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  HSBC is cutting as many as 15 percent of its 2,000 senior operations managers worldwide, as it attempts to streamline its management ranks and reduce costs, two sources with knowledge of the matter said.

  The global job cuts at the London-headquartered bank would fall across several business units and locations, and result in the loss of at least 200 positions, mostly with the title of chief operating officer (COO), the sources said.

  HSBC, which used to position itself as the world’s local bank, employs many COOs because country and business lines have their own separate COO, the sources said.

  

  The logo of HSBC is pictured on its headquarters at the financial Central district in Hong Kong on Aug. 4, 2020.

  Photo: REUTERS

  HSBC declined to comment.

  The lender has been shrinking its sprawling global business for several years, downsizing in many regions and exiting some countries entirely as it tries to improve shareholder returns.

  The latest cuts are already underway, one of the sources said.

  HSBC chief executive officer Noel Quinn said on Thursday that HSBC has identified US$1.7 billion of extra cost cuts it would make next year as it battles to meet an overall goal of costs rising by no more than 2 percent despite inflationary pressures.

  Incoming chief financial officer Georges Elhedery has been involved in the project to trim management headcount, the sources said.

  The initiative, codenamed “project banyan,” follows HSBC’s last major redundancy plan in 2020, which targeted about 35,000 job cuts globally across all staffing levels.

  Three separate sources confirmed job cuts were underway, as HSBC joins a chorus of other Western banks axing staff as a bleak global economic outlook weighs on business, consumer and investment banking revenues.

  All the sources declined to be named due to sensitivity of the matter.

  HSBC slightly increased its full-time staff this year, its third-quarter earnings showed, with headcount rising by 378 to 220,075 by Sept. 30 compared with Dec. 31 last year.

  The UK-based bank, which makes the bulk of its revenue and profit in Asia, is under pressure from its biggest shareholder, Chinese financial conglomerate Ping An Insurance Group Co (平安保險集團), to explore options to boost returns, including listing its Asian business.

  Last month, Ping An Asset Management, a wholly-owned unit of Ping An Insurance urged HSBC to aggressively reduce costs by cutting jobs and divesting peripheral non-Asian businesses, its first such public call.

  Besides considering layoffs, the bank should also look at reducing the cost of its global headquarters, Ping An Asset Management had said at that time.

  HSBC’s management plans to tell staff that the latest round of job cuts is part of its broader strategy to rein in expenses and improve earnings in tougher market conditions, one source said.

  On Wednesday, HSBC announced a possible sale of its business in New Zealand and its plans to close 114 branches in the UK.

  On Tuesday it said it had agreed to sell its much larger Canadian business to Royal Bank of Canada, further shrinking its global footprint after earlier sales of its US and French retail banks in the past two years.
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