Weaker European market expected to be at centre of potential HSBC job cuts
HSBC’s under-pressure European business is expected to bear the brunt of potential job cuts being made by the bank.
The lender is understood to be looking at cutting between 5,000 and 10,000 jobs as part of a cost-cutting drive under interim boss Noel Quinn.
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Analysts and industry sources are predicting that most of the cuts would come in weaker markets in Europe.
The group is said be be mulling the sale of its French retail arm where it employs several thousand workers.
One HSBC employee said: “I’ve not seen the numbers but the retail bit in France could well go…if a few thousand leave us through that it will make up a large part of the cost-cutting”.
Gary Greenwood, a banking analyst at Shore Capital, said: “The cuts are most likely to be in areas where there are weakest returns, which is the non-UK operations in Europe and its relatively small US business.”
He added: “I wouldn’t imagine there are many cuts in the ringfenced UK bank because it is a strong and profitable business”.
Reports of job cuts failed to move the bank’s share price today, which edged up less than one per cent in trading.
Any potential losses would come on top of 4,700 redundancies recently announced by HSBC, which employs almost 238,000 people around the world.
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David Madden, market analyst at CMC Markets UK, said: “HSBC is looking to trim down its costs, and the finance house seems to be playing catch-up with its peers who have been aggressively restructuring.
“The London-listed bank derives the bulk of its revenue in Asia, so it might be looking to reduce some of its headcount in Europe.”
The bank is the latest in a string of lenders to look at slashing costs amid depressed interest rates, Brexit tensions and rising geopolitical uncertainty.