Financial News
- 5 March 2013, 9:30
HSBC Sees Pre-Tax Profit Drop 6% To £13.7bn
HSBC has announced a pre-tax profit of £13.7bn for 2012, down 6% on the previous year.
The figure was below City forecasts of around £15.6bn.
The banking group makes an estimated 90% of its money outside Britain and has benefited from its exposure to emerging markets in Asia.
Chief executive Stuart Gulliver was revealed to have been awarded a bonus of £1.95m.
On Saturday, Sky News City Editor Mark Kleinman reported Mr Gulliver was expected to receive a bonus of just under £2m.
His package of base pay, bonus and long-term share awards reached £6.2m, and with other benefits and pension contributions the package amounts to £7.4m.
His total pay and benefits package - equal to being paid £20,273 each day - compares with £8m a year earlier.
Mr Gulliver's bonus payment will be deferred and subject to possible clawback, while he will not be able to cash it in until he retires from or leaves HSBC.
The company's total bonus pot was £2.4bn, down from £2.8bn in the previous year.
More than 200 staff at the bank will be given pay and bonuses above £1m.
This comes despite HSBC having set aside a total of £1.5bn in total to cover the cost of mis-selling of payment protection insurance to UK customers.
It has also made provision to set aside £400 over mis-selling of complex rate swaps to small British businesses.
Last December the bank confirmed it would pay $1.92bn (£1.2bn) to settle a money-laundering probe by US authorities - the largest penalty of its kind ever paid by a bank.
The penalty related to financial transactions suspected of coming from Mexican drug cartels.
At the time of the fine Mr Gulliver said his firm accepted responsibility for its past mistakes.
"The HSBC of today is a fundamentally different organisation from the one that made those mistakes" he said in a statement.
US investigators also focused on the transfer of money on behalf of nations such as Iran.
The bank is listed on stock exchanges in both Hong Kong and London, and is Britain's biggest lender by market capitalisation,
In mid-morning London trading HSBC shares were down more than 2.6%.
davenlesley
9:46am on 4/3/2013
Wow ! Only 13.7 BILLION profit. Times must be really hard in the banking industry. Time some of these bonus's were trimmed back
Adam Green
10:47am on 4/3/2013
Typical uniformed "bash the bankers" comment. It's a very large company with 700 offices in 85 countries employing over 300,000 people. It's also well run, which is why it makes a profit. But of course it's a Bank, and we must all castigate Banks these days mustn't we !!
davenlesley
11:02am on 4/3/2013
Adam. That is where you are wrong. There have been many stupid comments on here which blame the banks for everything that has happened to the UK economy since 2007. If you can find one from me you must have very good eyesight. My gripe is the number of banks that pay a bonus for FAILURE,
Adam Green
5:11pm on 4/3/2013
??? You are griping here and this bank plainly is not a failure ???
davenlesley
11:12am on 5/3/2013
Adam. You are not seriously suggesting that a 6% pre tax drop in profits is an improvement are you ?
Adam Green
9:27am on 6/3/2013
I didn't say it was an improvement, so please don't twist my words to suit your argument. I said it was not a failure. Profits are down, but if you read the article, as a result so are bonuses, which makes sense. The Bank is however still making a good profit, so rewarding this with bonuses also makes sense.