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HSBC Holdings will maintain its stake in Bank of Communications Co and continue an alliance with its Chinese partner after ending a credit-card venture, the head of the London-based lender’s Asia Pacific operations said in Beijing yesterday.
HSBC, which holds roughly a 19% stake in Shanghai-based Bank of Communications, got approval for its own credit-card business in China that it operates jointly with BoCom, Asia Pacific CEO Peter Wong said in an interview on the sidelines of the National People’s Congress session yesterday in Beijing. HSBC is getting a licence for a planned brokerage venture with Shenzhen Qianhai Financial Holdings Co, Wong said.
“We have a very good relationship with Bank of Communications,” Wong said. “We have a lot of businesses we are joint venturing together,” Wong said. Leaving the credit card joint venture doesn’t mean an end to the alliance, he said.
HSBC’s holdings in BoCom have been in focus after rival Citigroup sold its stake in China Guangfa Bank Co. HSBC is the only global bank that has retained a major holding in a big bank in China after earlier exits by the likes of Bank of America and Goldman Sachs Group.
HSBC is rethinking plans in China after the bank saw its first pretax loss in the fourth quarter as profit from Asia fell 14% with the slowdown in the Chinese economy and crashing commodities prices. Chief executive officer Stuart Gulliver said that the bank is slowing a plan to add 4,000 jobs in China’s Pearl River Delta region near Hong Kong to five years from three years because of economic and government turmoil.
“The plan will continue, but we just have to pace ourselves,” Wong said. “We don’t want to hire a lot of people when the economy is slowing down.” There will be a “net addition” of people to the region, he said. China’s legislature, the National People’s Congress, began its annual session yesterday in Beijing. Premier Li Keqiang started the meeting off by announcing a growth target of 6.5% to 7%, below last year’s target of 7% and the first time it has set a range in more than two decades.
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