HSBC Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript

Quartr
Provided by Quartr
February 21, 2024

There are 13 speakers on the call.

Operator

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Investor and Analyst Webinar for HSBC Holdings Plc's 2023 Annual Results. For your information, this webinar is being recorded. At this time, I will hand over to Noel Quinn, Group Chief Executive.

Speaker 1

Good afternoon to those in Hong Kong and great to see you all. Good morning to those watching in London and around the world. Before George takes you through the Q4 numbers, I'll make some opening comments. 1st, I'm really pleased with performance that the team delivered in 2023. We reported $30,000,000,000 of PBT for the first time ever, and we delivered a return on tangible equity of 14.6 percent or 15.6 percent excluding material notable items.

Speaker 1

2nd, there were some items in the 4th quarter which make it harder to understand the underlying performance. George will take you through them in detail. But I want to stress there was still good underlying growth in the 4th quarter. Excluding the impact of notable items and Argentina hyperinflation, our profit before tax was $7,300,000,000 3rd, we distributed $19,000,000,000 of capital returns to our shareholders in respect of 2023. This included a full year dividend of $0.61 per share, which is the highest since 2,008 and $7,000,000,000 of share buybacks, which have reduced the share count by over 4% at completion of the current buyback.

Speaker 1

4th, we still expect to have substantial distribution capacity going forward. We've announced a further share buyback of up to $2,000,000,000 We're committed to considering a special dividend of $0.21 per share as a priority use of the Canada proceeds, subject to the completion of the transaction. And we finished the year with a strong CET1 ratio of 14.8 percent which will be further boosted by the Canada deal. 5th, we remain committed to cost discipline. We have flow through impact of 2023 inflation on our costs this year, but expect a downward trend in inflationary pressures in 2025 beyond.

Speaker 1

We continue to invest in growth opportunities and the digitization of our business to drive incremental efficiencies. We remain very focused on funding much of that investment through cost saving initiatives. Finally, we expect to have further opportunities to grow revenue, even in a lower rate environment. George will take you through how we're reducing our sensitivity to rate movements. And we do acknowledge the downside risk to NII.

Speaker 1

But we're confident that we have the levers for growth that allow us to deliver mid teen returns in 2024. I'll take you through some of these levers later, But let me now hand over to George.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Noel. Warm welcome to everyone here in Hong Kong. For those of you watching in London, good morning and thank you for joining our full year 2023 results call. We delivered a good underlying business performance in the 4th quarter. Let me first start by clarifying that our reported profit before tax was impacted by CAD5.8 billion of notable items and a further CAD0.5 billion from Argentina hyperinflation, including the more than 50% devaluation of the peso in December.

Speaker 2

Let me unpack 3 of those notable items. First, we reinstated the impairment on the sale of our France retail business as signaled at the Q3. 2nd, we booked $400,000,000 of treasury disposal losses in the quarter, again in line with the guidance at the 3rd quarter to extend the duration of hedges in anticipation of rate decreases. And finally, as you know, each quarter we conduct a value in use test on the carrying value of our investment in BoCom, described in detail in our annual report and accounts. Following the outcomes of that test in Q4, we took a charge of $3,000,000,000 in the quarter against our carrying value.

Speaker 2

The charge had an insignificant impact on CET1 capital and our CET1 ratio and no impact on our dividends or share buyback. And just to be clear, this has no impact on our strategy in Mainland China, has no impact on our strategic relationship with BoComm and it has no impact on HSBC's or BoComm's operation, strategy or outlook. So on a reported basis, our profit before tax was $1,000,000,000 in the Q4, down $4,000,000,000 from the Q4 of 2022. Excluding the $6,300,000,000 impact of notable items in Argentina hyperinflation, our profit before tax was $7,300,000,000 up $700,000,000 versus the Q4 of 2022, primarily due to growth in banking NII. On the next slide, so on a reported basis, 4th quarter revenue was down 1.6 $1,000,000,000 compared to the same period last year due to the impact of notable items in Argentina hyperinflation.

Speaker 2

Excluding these, our revenue was up $1,500,000,000 primarily banking NII. The strength of our deposit franchise, our access to 2 d pools of liquidity in the UK and Hong Kong and our enviable balance sheet made it possible for us to benefit from the more favorable rate environment. On the next slide, 4th quarter NII and banking NII were again impacted by Argentina hyperinflation and reclassification of cash flow hedge revenue between NII and non NII. Excluding these, both NII and Banking NII were broadly stable on the Q3 and NIM was down 3 basis points, primarily due to higher time deposit costs and deposit migration in Hong Kong. Turning to the outlook.

Speaker 2

Taking our 4th quarter banking NII and adjusting for Argentina hyperinflation and the reclassification of cash flow hedge revenue and the disposal of our France retail and Canada businesses gives you an annualized run rate of just above $43,000,000,000 That should be your starting point for modeling our 2024 Banking NII. We expect 4 key variables to drive our banking NII from that starting point in 2024: Changes in interest rates, the reinvestment of maturing structural hedge assets at higher yield, deposit migration, particularly here in Hong Kong and balance sheet movements. There is a degree of uncertainty inherent in all of these. We're guiding towards the banking NII of at least $41,000,000,000 in 2024. This is our current estimate of the bottom end of the range of reasonable outcomes and is intended to help you with your modeling.

Speaker 2

We will continue updating further as the year unfolds. And before turning to non NII, I'd like to direct your attention to the chart on the bottom right of this slide. Over the last 18 months, our banking NII sensitivity has reduced by around $3,500,000,000 More than 1 third of this reduction is due to increased structural interest rate hedging. Subject to market conditions, we expect to increase both the notional and the duration of our structural hedge in the coming quarters in order to reduce our banking NII sensitivity still further. Non NII was down $900,000,000 compared to the same quarter last year due to notable items in Argentina hyperinflation.

Speaker 2

And again, excluding these, non NII was up $1,700,000,000 versus the same quarter last year. This was primarily due to the revenue offset into non NII from the central cost of funding, Global Banking and Markets trading activity, which is included in banking NII. And from the cash flow hedge income reclassification between NII and non NII I referred to previously. Other non NII was up modestly versus the same quarter last year, including an increase of $0,100,000,000 in net fee income, primarily in Commercial Banking and Wealth and Personal Banking. Looking at non NII from our 2 strategic activities of Wholesale Transaction Banking and Wealth.

Speaker 2

In Wholesale Transaction Banking, non NII was up 2% on the Q4 of 2022. There was good growth in Global Payments Solution, in trade and in foreign exchange, reflecting the strength of our international network and transaction banking capabilities, as well as increased client activity and repricing initiatives. This was partly offset by a relatively small decrease in security services. In Wealth, non NII in both asset management and private banking grow by double digits versus the Q4 of last year due to an increase in assets under management, partly driven by net new invested assets. However, total wealth non NII was down 0 $100,000,000 as a result of a $200,000,000 correction to historical valuation estimates in our insurance business.

Speaker 2

For the full year, non NII in wholesale transaction banking was $10,600,000,000 up 5% on 2022 and $6,000,000,000 in wealth, up 7%. Turning now to credit. Our 4th quarter ECL charge was $1,000,000,000 primarily in wholesale. This brought our full year ECL charge to $3,400,000,000 which was 33 basis points of average customer loans, including those held for sale, or 36 basis points excluding those, and within our full year 2023 guidance. Due to ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty, we're guiding towards ECLs of around 40 basis points for 2024.

Speaker 2

We took an ECL charge of $200,000,000 for Mainland China commercial real estate in the Q4 as part of the $1,000,000,000 charge for the quarter referenced in the last slide. This brought the full year charge on this portfolio to $1,000,000,000 crystallizing the plausible downside scenario that we set out last February. Our main area of focus remains the portfolio booked in Hong Kong. That exposure is now $6,300,000,000 down $1,200,000,000 in the quarter and down $3,100,000,000 compared to full year 2022. We continue to monitor the sector closely and we are comfortable with our current level of provisions.

Speaker 2

Turning to costs. Full year 2023 costs on a constant currency basis were down 1%. On a target basis, full year 2023 costs came in 1% higher than our Q3 guidance, driven by 3 items that unexpectedly landed in the Q4. First, the FDIC special assessment, which we expected to be incurred over 2024 and 2025. 2nd, the UK bank levy was higher than forecast, primarily due to adjustments relating to prior years.

Speaker 2

And third, there was an offsetting benefit from Argentina hyperinflation in the quarter. Looking ahead, we are aiming to limit cost growth to around 5% in 2024 on a target basis, which excludes the reduction in 2024 costs from the France retail and Canada disposals. This will be driven by the flow through impact of 2023 inflation to 2024 costs, investment and volume growth and partly offset by cost saving initiatives. On the next slide, customer lending and deposits were broadly stable versus the 3rd quarter once you exclude the sale of our France retail business. Without that, there was $35,000,000,000 of deposit growth, of which $27,000,000,000 was in Asia, with around half of this in Hong Kong.

Speaker 2

Deposit growth in Asia benefited from seasonality and we would expect at least some of that growth to reverse in the course of Q1. Turning now to capital. Our CET1 ratio at the end of 2023 was 14.8%, which was down 0.1 percentage points on the Q3. There are 3 things I'd like to draw your attention to. First, as I said earlier, the BOCOM charge had an insignificant impact on CET1 capital and our CET1 ratio,

Speaker 3

due to

Speaker 2

the compensating reduction in regulatory capital threshold deductions and it had no impact on dividends or share buybacks. 2nd, we expect the share buyback announced today to have an impact of around 25 basis points on our CET1 ratio in the first quarter of 2024. And finally, we expect the Canada sale to generate around 1.2 percentage points of CET1 in the Q1 of 2024. We remain committed to consider a €0.21 per share special dividend in the first half of twenty twenty four as a priority use of the sale proceeds, which equates to around 0.5 percentage points of CET1. Before I hand back to Noel, I am pleased to share some enhancements that we have made with regard to our international disclosures.

Speaker 2

There are 2 sets of data and Noel will also comment further on them. Starting with our wholesale business, let me walk you through the data on this slide. In 2023, we generated $33,500,000,000 of client revenue across Commercial Banking and Global Banking end markets. Of this, $20,400,000,000 was generated from multi jurisdictional clients. By this, we mean clients that bank with us in more than one market.

Speaker 2

The charts on the right show that 2 thirds of the client revenue we generate from those clients comes from providing them with services in markets outside their home market where they also bank with us. It is also worth pointing out that 2 thirds of multi jurisdictional client revenue or $13,400,000,000 was generated from client whose home market is in the West, with the remaining $7,000,000,000 from clients whose home market is in the East. Turning now to WPP International Revenue. More than $10,000,000,000 or 40% of our WPP revenue comes from international customers, around 2 thirds of which is generated in Asia. So to summarize, both the wholesale and WPP client revenue data clearly demonstrates the strength of our international network and our unique capability to serve international clients.

Speaker 2

Our network and further investments into our international proposition position us to capture an even greater share of this vital, fast growing segment. Let me now hand back to Nour.

Speaker 1

Thanks, George. Thank you, George. You've just heard about good underlying performance in the 4th quarter. And George has introduced more detailed information about our international revenue. Our Wholesale International business model is a mature and differentiated business model with substantial scale.

Speaker 1

And in recent years, we have started to develop and invest in our WPB international business model. What George's slide showed is that already 40% of WPB revenue comes from international customers and we believe we can take it much further. So let me now turn to how we will drive revenue growth not just this year and next but over the next 3 to 4 years. As always, I'll begin with our purpose, ambition, strategy and values. These have helped to drive the good underlying business growth which, alongside supportive interest rates, have given us strong momentum.

Speaker 1

In the short term, we're conscious of the potential downside risk to NII. The structural hedging we have put in place will help to protect that income. But we do have some clear focus areas under our 4 strategic pillars which I will cover on the following slides. Starting with focus. And our international wholesale business, which remains our biggest competitive advantage and because of its scale our biggest growth opportunity.

Speaker 1

In the past, our businesses in the West were primarily focused on domestic clients. Over the last 4 years, we have repositioned those businesses to align them with our international strategy, exiting low return and low growth domestic RWAs. The result is the differentiated model you see today. In commercial banking, we are unique in our ability to serve clients across multiple geographies, which is what HSBC was founded to do. The result was the $13,300,000,000 of profit before tax that commercial banking generated last year.

Speaker 1

In Global Banking and Markets, I believe we are uniquely positioned to connect clients between West and East, which was evident in our market leading performances in markets like the Middle East and businesses like Global Foreign Exchange. We have clearly got a strong international franchise. As you can see, we facilitated more than $850,000,000,000 of trade last year with the diversification of supply chains leading to revenue growth opportunities for HSBC. We ranked 2nd globally by revenue in our payments business and processed around $500,000,000,000,000 of electronic payments. And we've been number 3 globally by revenue in FX since 2021.

Speaker 1

But I believe there is significant amount of untapped opportunity still to go for, which can drive revenue growth in the face of declining interest rates. Importantly, this potential revenue growth is not necessarily dependent on GDP as that growth opportunity already exists within our client base. And it is often fee based and strongly influenced by opportunities that are inherent to our international nature of our client base. To provide some evidence of this growth potential, we grew wholesale multi jurisdictional client revenue by 29% in 2023. And the revenue multiplier for multi jurisdictional corporate clients in commercial banking was 5 times that of an average domestic only customer.

Speaker 1

I'm pleased that international isn't just a wholesale story. We are doing more with our WPB customers as well, Building our wealth business to meet the rising demand for wealth management services, especially here in Asia, has been a strategic priority in recent years. So I'm pleased that we attracted net new invested assets of $84,000,000,000 last year compared to $80,000,000,000 in 2022 $64,000,000,000 in 2021. This is a good indicator of future revenue opportunities, which again is often fee income and should benefit in a lower interest rate environment as investors shift from cash reserves into invested asset classes. Another trend is the growing demand for seamless cross border banking services.

Speaker 1

Innovation is key here and we hadn't innovated enough in this space in the past which meant we weren't offering our customers what they wanted. But we are now. Global Money has more than 1,300,000 customers up from 550,000 a year ago. We also launched a new strengthened international banking proposition. Overall, we grew revenue from WPB International Customers by 41% last year from $7,200,000,000 to $10,200,000,000 And while you might assume this was driven solely by higher rates, I'm pleased to say there was a 43% jump in new to bank international WPB customers last year.

Speaker 1

Again, these are higher revenue generating customers, bringing in 3 times as much revenue as an average domestic only customer. Next is the continued growth in our 2 home markets. Our leading propositions in Hong Kong and the UK provide us with deep liquidity and a differentiated proposition. These two pools of liquidity underpin our exceptionally strong balance sheet, which gives us the safety and security that our clients trust us to provide. Hong Kong and the UK are both highly connected global financial centers.

Speaker 1

We have increased our market leading share of trade finance in Hong Kong by 6.6 percentage points over the last 3 years. This included a 2.4 percentage point increase last year alone. We are also ideally positioned to capitalize as the mass affluent population in Hong Kong and Mainland China continues to grow. Driven by rapid urbanization across Mainland China and the increased use of the connect schemes between Mainland China and Hong Kong. We grew new to bank retail customers in Hong Kong by 36% over the last 3 years, including by capitalizing on the significant increase of visitors from Mainland China post reopening.

Speaker 1

In the UK, we also have good traction in Commercial Banking. In 2023, we were the number one bank for UK large corporates as well as the best bank in the UK for SMEs according to Euromoney. And we are continuing to grow in wealth and personal banking. We attracted over 1,000,000 Neutrbank customers in the UK last year. And we've had steady mortgage growth, increasing our market share of UK stock to 8%.

Speaker 1

As economic conditions improve and we continue to invest, we're confident in our ability to grow our business further in these critical areas. Next, I showed a slide like this last year to demonstrate how we've gone from a business that depended on our home markets for the vast majority of our profits while the rest of the franchise underperformed to 1 with broad based profitability across markets. This slide shows the increasing profitability of these diversified growth opportunities. The number one rankings speak for themselves. And I especially want to call out the great work that the Global Banking and Markets team are doing in the Middle East.

Speaker 1

They now topped these rankings 3 years in a row in a region that presents significant growth opportunities going forward. India, Mainland China excluding associates, and Singapore all contributed more than $1,000,000,000 of profits in 2023, with Singapore doing so for the first time. This underlines why HSBC was named best bank in Asia by Euromoney. But there was strong growth across all these markets. The next slide underlines that we have reshaped our portfolio to reinforce strengths while exiting areas of underperformance and or lower strategic priority.

Speaker 1

Over the last 12 months, we've announced exits in a number of our smaller markets. This is one way that we expect to take out further costs, alongside our continued focus on improving the internal efficiency of the bank. And by making savings, we can invest in the areas on the left that help us to drive growth. Before I move on, I want to mention SVB UK. Everyone knows that HSBC is an international bank.

Speaker 1

But we also have a long history of supporting innovative entrepreneurs. And the acquisition of SVB UK enabled us to build a bigger proposition that can can help us to become known as the go to bank for innovation companies. It's encouraging that innovation banking had its best ever quarter for customer onboarding in the Q4 of 2023. I'm also encouraged by how many of those innovative companies want to take their capabilities cross border. The next slide sets out how we're investing in technology to make customer experiences better, sell processes more efficient and our cost of execution lower.

Speaker 1

I'm pleased to see more of our personal and corporate customers are mobile and digitally active. HSBC has traditionally grown by cross selling products to our existing banking clients. But innovation also enables us to open up growth avenues that are beyond our traditional customer footprint. Xyng is one such growth avenue because it offers cross border payment capabilities but critically it is targeted at non HSBC customers. Our embedded finance joint venture announced with TradeShift last year is another such growth avenue.

Speaker 1

It's still early days for both but they will allow us to break outside of the existing business model. I will also briefly cover our final two pillars. There isn't a conversation I have with a client where the net zero transition doesn't come up. Our first net zero transition plan shows how we intend to finance and support the transition to net 0 and collaborate globally to help enable change at scale. It will be a complex journey, but we have exactly the right geographic footprint where the need and opportunity are greatest.

Speaker 1

Finally, energize. Over the last 4 years, we've increased the pace of execution across the organization. The management team is confident about the business. But it's even more important that our colleagues are confident. Because when they are, we stand a much greater chance of succeeding.

Speaker 1

So I'm pleased that our 2023 staff survey showed the number of colleagues seeing the positive impact of our strategy was up 11 percentage points from 2020 to 73%. And I'm also very excited by the number of quality new hires we've been able to bring into the organization over the last 12 months. It's also a vote of confidence in our strategy and the momentum we have built over the last 4 years. In summary, I will go back to what I said at the start. I'm really pleased with how we performed in 2020 3 and the contribution that our people made.

Speaker 1

We reported $30,000,000,000 of PBT for the first time and a mid teens ROTE. There was good underlying growth in the Q4. Excluding the impact of notable items on Argentina hyperinflation, our profit before tax was $7,300,000,000 We distributed $19,000,000,000 capital returns to our shareholders in respect of 2023. This included the best full year dividend since 2,008 and 3 share buybacks. And we still expect to have substantial distribution capacity going forward.

Speaker 1

We remain committed to cost discipline and we expect to have further opportunities to grow revenue even in a lower rate environment. We're confident that we have the levers for growth that allow us to deliver mid teens returns in 2024. With that, let me hand over to Neil for Q and A.

Speaker 3

Thanks.

Speaker 4

If you are dialed into the call and you want to ask a question, please use the raise hand feature in Zoom. Make sure your camera is and microphone are turned on and wait for the prompt. For the people in the room, please wait for the microphone and make sure to state your name and the name of your institution before asking your question. We'll start with questions in the room. Okay, Gurpreet.

Speaker 1

Thank you.

Speaker 5

Gurpreet Sahi from Goldman. Two questions, if I may, please. The first one is on FY 'twenty five and beyond. We note that the ROAT guidance for this year. But if there can be any comments regarding the ROTE for 'twenty five and beyond, in particular, if the banking NII sensitivity for the next 100 basis points of rate cuts can be kind of guided to us.

Speaker 5

The second one is around the gain, the implied improvement in the capital from the gain in Canadian operations. And that remains at around 10,000,000,000 of which 4,000,000,000 can be special dividend. So the €6,000,000,000 have you decided on how much between capital distribution to shareholders and then business growth? Thank you.

Speaker 1

Thank you very much for your questions. I'll ask George to cover both of those, please.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Noel. Thanks, Gupri. So we have not at this stage given guidance for full year 'twenty five. I point you to the guidance we've given for full year 'twenty four of at least $41,000,000,000 in banking NII and mid teens return on tangible equity. In terms of banking NII sensitivity, we do have a slide at the back end of the deck, which I can point you to, which shows for the further 100 basis points and for future years, what's the impact.

Speaker 2

What I can point you to is number 1, we continue to intend to increase subject to market conditions, but as of today to increase the structural hedge. 2nd, the volume of the structural hedge. 2nd, we continue to intend to increase the weighted average life of the structured hedge, having now reached 2.8 years and with the intent to take it to above 3 years, both of which should give you a sense of how we're mitigating rate impacts into 2024 and 2025 from the structural hedging activity. With regards to gain on Canada, so $10,000,000,000 proceeds, dollars 4,000,000,000 will be considered what we committed to consider as a priority use for a special dividend. The residual SEK 6,000,000,000 will constitute about 0.8%, 0.9% additional CET1, which may which very likely will be at the Q1 outcome.

Speaker 2

We will continue looking at opportunities, but it remains our intent subject to market conditions, our capital position, regulatory position. It remains our intent to continue a rolling series of share buybacks beyond this one. Thank you. Any others in the room?

Speaker 4

Okay. So we'll take our first question from the line will be from Andrew Coombs from Citi.

Speaker 1

Andrew, hi.

Speaker 6

Good morning from London. Good afternoon to yourselves. Two questions, please. Firstly, I just want to clarify the messaging on the banking NII outlook. If I rewind 12 months ago, I think you gave guidance for greater than £36,000,000,000 of reported NII, but then this time a year ago, you said you weren't seeking to move consensus, which at the time was actually higher, was it €37,000,000 If I fast forward to today, you're guiding to greater than 41.

Speaker 6

If I look at consensus NII, I adjust the trading book funding cost, it looks like consensus banking NII is around 44. So are you seeking to rebase consensus banking NII or should we put greater emphasis on your greater than within that 41 target? So that's my first question. I just want to clarify that messaging. My second question is around the hedge.

Speaker 6

Thank you for the disclosure on the €478,000,000,000 nominal and the 2.8 years average life. Can you give us an idea of both the average yield on that book and also what it's currently rolling off at and what you're aiming to roll it back on at if you are extending the duration out? Thank you.

Speaker 1

I think George will answer both of those.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Andrew. So obviously, today, we cannot see consensus banking NII. And basically, I'll use this opportunity to ask you collectively if you can start giving us your banking NII. So we can see the NII forecasts and then the funding costs of the trading book gets lumped together with the non NII and it's to be fair difficult for us to unpack it, although SEK 44,000,000,000 does sound high if try to do the math ourselves. But let me take a step back and just walk you through how we're thinking about NII.

Speaker 2

And just bear with me for 2 minutes, but I think that explanation will probably help guide you. So we start from the Q4, dollars 10,700,000,000 banking NII. We would adjust then Q4 for the parts related to Argentina hyperinflation as well as the reclassification of the cash flow hedges between NII and non NII will adjust for the part that does not pertain to Q4. So that's a full year correction. And that's about an additional $500,000,000 you could use on the Q4 10.7 number.

Speaker 2

So that takes you to 11.2 adjusted quarterly run rate. Annualized, take into account day counts, you get to 44.4. From that 44.4, remember you have to deduct the full year French NII, France retail NII, as well as 3 quarters from the Canada NII, which together combined come to about $1,300,000,000 So $44,400,000,000 minus 1.3 dollars takes you to just above $43,000,000,000 That would be our starting position, if you want, in terms of an annualization of run rate, factoring in factoring in structural hedges, etcetera. Now from that SEK 43,000,000,000, there are various tailwinds and headwinds. We have the tailwind of reinvestment of all the structural hedges from lower rates into the current rate environment.

Speaker 2

We do have some tailwinds, probably cautious on H1, but tailwinds beyond H1 in terms of volume growth and loan growth. And we do have headwinds, including the rate cycle, if indeed we start seeing the decreases in the second half of the year. And we obviously have the headwinds, which we've observed, specifically in Hong Kong around deposit migration to term deposits. Kind of baking all of that into account, we're getting to the guidance of at least SEK 41,000,000,000 that we're comfortable sharing today. With regards to structural hedge, we have shared with you volume.

Speaker 2

We have shared with you the weighted average life and we have shared with you now banking NII sensitivity. We have not yet shared and we have not yet found the level of standard we would need to be able to share the yield. But what I can tell you about the yield is that both the yield of the maturing hedges being replaced at current rates as well as the additional hedges we're doing with inverted curves are all baked into our at least $41,000,000,000 banking NII guidance.

Speaker 1

So if I could just add a couple of comments. One reason we're not giving a statement regarding consensus is, as George says, we think consensus is a mixture of updated thinking that has adjusted for some of these annualization effects of disposals and other things, and some consensus hasn't adjusted for that at the moment. So I think there's a little bit of apples and pears in today's consensus position. So what George is clearly trying to articulate for you is take the Q4, adjust it for the known items, get to a new starting position of £43,000,000,000 and he's underpinned that starting position of £43,000,000,000 with at least £41,000,000,000 Therefore, the range of modeling is going to be somewhere between £41,000,000,000 43,000,000 percent depending on the assumptions you might make on the headwinds and the tailwinds. And we think that given that lack of consistency on consensus, the uncertainty in the market, that's probably the best way to guide you on banking NII.

Speaker 1

There's a very clear repositioning of the starting position to get us back on an apples and apples basis. And then the other thing no, that was it. That's what I wanted to say, those two comments. Thank you.

Speaker 6

Thank you, guys.

Speaker 1

Next question.

Speaker 4

We'll take one from the room. Catherine?

Speaker 1

Thank you. Welcome.

Speaker 7

From JPMorgan. So I have two questions here. The first question is I want to clarify the mid teen ROTE's guidance is our normalized ROTE. That means that the ROTE, excluding Canada disposal gain. So I want to clarify that because if that is the case in mid teen ROTE's, then if you look at the company compiled consensus, I think the royalty is 17.4%.

Speaker 7

Then I just calculated on a very top down basis excluding the disposal gain, then consensus royalty is roughly about mid teen as well. But the thing is that I think that means that, the HSBC guidance and consensus is quite in line in terms of normalized royalty. But I think on NII on cost, NII I think in the previous questions I think there may be a bit of reset in expectation. And then I think cost the 5% cost is a bit higher than where consensus was indicating then that means does it mean that you are quite optimistic on non NII growth I. E.

Speaker 7

Fee growth or maybe you have a different view on asset quality and hence the ECL charges I think this is the first part of the big question. The second part is on BoComm. May I know like what trigger the $3,000,000,000 impairment charges? And as China's yield is declining, like they just announced a 25 basis point on 5 year LPL cuts and all those, Should we be expecting more impairments on the BoComm investment? So basically, I want to see if there is any one time off events that trigger this impairment or if it is going to be a normalized part of the business.

Speaker 7

So I think in the statement, you clearly stated that there will have no impact on dividend and shareholders' return. I believe this is related to the $14,000,000,000 capital deduction which you have already made on associate. I think that is primarily BoComm. But can you explain a bit of that mechanism because I think today's share price reaction is partly factoring in the kind of concern that if there is an ongoing impairment on BoComm that will affect the company's ability to deliver shareholders' return, yes.

Speaker 1

Two excellent questions and you're going to get 2 excellent answers from George.

Speaker 2

Thank you, Catherine. So Catherine, taking them in the order you say this. First, mid teens ROTE is excluding notable items. Therefore, it is excluding the gain on Canada. So your calculation is correct.

Speaker 2

In terms of NII and cost, so a couple of things to share and we recognize the cost assessment. In terms of banking NII, we have given the guidance here. Just point to I mentioned it in my earlier speech, but just point to that our bank NII sensitivity has reduced more than by more than half from the full year 2022 due to among other parameters our structured hedging activity. So therefore, the rate impact on our banking NII is reduced commensurately. Equally, we do have some anticipation of volume growth if and when rates start increasing, which is now planned for H2.

Speaker 2

And this is why we have some positive outlook for H2. If rates decrease, volume could pick up subject to economic conditions, etcetera. But that's the assessment we have made today. And then thirdly, on the non rate sensitive earnings, I've called out transaction banking and wealth earlier. Between them, they constitute about 80% of our non rate sensitive earnings.

Speaker 2

1 has grown 5% 23% to 2022% and the other one has grown 7%. And therefore, we do feel there is momentum in both these areas for continued growth. And I didn't talk about the residual 20%, but in the residual 20%, capital market activities, for instance, is included. And again, in a different rate environment, we have grounds to believe this can also pick up. So yes, we are comfortable with the momentum we have in the revenue.

Speaker 2

Can I put you on one thing about cost? We called it out 5% for the 2024 has a flow through impact from inflation in 2023. 2023 experienced high inflation. There is some flow through, some adjustments, including wage inflation, which we anticipate to do in 2024. Based on current outlook of inflation, that parameter is easing as we look forward beyond 2024 Without giving you any guidance for 2025, the inflationary component flow through into 2025 does look like easing from where we stand today looking at 2024 outlook for inflation.

Speaker 2

If I move on to your second question about Bocom, So this is we do talk about the value in use model. It's following the Hong Kong accounting standards, international accounting standards. Without boring you with the accounting details, the ARNA has many pages, which we can point you to that explain it. It feeds into parameters all in the essentially in the public domain, including macro data, other factors, including analysts comments, feeds into the model. But the model is not highly intuitive, but the outcome is the outcome.

Speaker 2

And we've been consistently applying it for umpteen quarters now, and therefore, we'll apply it for Q4. It is very difficult to predict what the model will give us in Q1. We will take into account the information we receive over the course of Q1 and we will run the model as we do every quarter and consistently apply the outcome. Finally, capital deduction. I think this is a very important point.

Speaker 2

Your math, Catherine, is correct. There is about $14,000,000,000 sitting today in our regulatory capital deductions because they sit above our threshold. Therefore, you could legitimately assume that there is that much of buffer against any impairments we face in our financial holdings, Bokom being one of them. The other one is insurance. That's the 2 essentially that is it.

Speaker 2

And therefore you can legitimately assume that the compensation we would get from any hypothetical future impairment will be commensurate given the size of our threshold deductions at

Speaker 4

this stage. Sadie, to give

Speaker 1

you 2 excellent answers. Thank you. Thanks, George. Thanks, Noah. Next question, please.

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Joseph Dickerson at Jefferies.

Speaker 1

Joseph?

Speaker 2

Hi. Joseph, we cannot hear you. You may need

Speaker 1

to Yes.

Speaker 8

Can you hear me now? Yes. Sorry about that. Just cutting to the chase on the you hear me?

Speaker 4

Yes. Yes.

Speaker 8

So just cutting to the chase on some of the questions that have come through on the NII guide, I think you can probably get a sense that there's some reasonable confusion about what the message is for the 2024 baseline. If we work back from your kind of clean mid teens ROE, you've given us some guidance on cost, you've given us some guidance on credit. It's kind of getting into a baseline revenue number of about $64,000,000,000 in consensus of $63,500,000 or thereabouts. Are you comfortable with that consensus number? Are you seeking to change that with this guide?

Speaker 8

So that is question number 1. And question number 2 is, why the focus on banking, NII, versus total NII because there's going to be as rates come down a lot of moving parts on the trading book funding cost dynamic because indeed if I look at your annual report, you've actually got a benefit coming through in the USD bucket from rates falling in terms of the aggregate NII. So I guess, why are you trying to distinguish between those 2 conceptually for us? Because I think it's again, it's creating a fair amount of confusion with investors.

Speaker 2

George? Thank you, Noel. Joseph, yes, so I recognize your arithmetic. And yes, I agree with your arithmetic. This being said, I cannot give you guidance on total revenue.

Speaker 2

Otherwise, I'll be giving you guidance on our full profitability. But we recognize your arithmetic. A couple of things just to highlight, if you want to for your consideration. The first one is our guidance for banking NII is not $41,000,000,000 It's at least $41,000,000,000 factoring in elements of uncertainty that I called out earlier, that's for full year 2024. You do have the building blocks for cost and for ECL.

Speaker 2

And then the residual part, if you want, of our earnings story is the non NII component, excluding the gains from Canada. And as I said earlier, about 80% of it is generated from transaction banking and wealth, both of which do have momentum, both of which are areas where we continue investing, both in terms of digital capabilities and client servicing and in terms of net new invested assets. And we are excited about the potential of these two businesses. And we believe our mid teens Roti is not based on unreasonable growth in these areas. It's based on momentum growth in these areas.

Speaker 2

Maybe I can point you to our net new invested assets, dollars 84,000,000,000 for the year, up from $80,000,000,000 last year, up from $64,000,000,000 the year before. So clearly, we're acquiring new assets. But equally, as you've seen, asset management private banking grew double digit percentage points. That's also partly due to the valuation increase. So our AUM is also increasing because the underlying valuation is improving, which is therefore a generator of fees commensurately subject to market conditions as we go forward.

Speaker 1

Josie, I think if there's any more questions, maybe we get the IR team to just work with you after the call.

Speaker 9

Thank you.

Speaker 2

Just on your second point, so we're guiding we would like to move to banking NII guidance. We recognize last year we have moved from NII into a dual guidance of NII and funding cost of the trading book. We think it is much simpler to look at our overall rate sensitive earnings through banking NII lens. The kind of shift from 1 to the other, which is a zero sum game, so it moves from 1 to the other, is reflective of business decisions as regards how much of our funding we would want to give to the trading book based on various parameters, including opportunities in the trading book as well as opportunities for loan growth. And we would think that it would be too noisy if we have to really manage both on a separate basis.

Speaker 1

Thank you. Next question, please.

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Benjamin Toms at RBC. Benjamin, hi.

Speaker 10

Good morning, both. Thank you for taking my questions. Firstly, on cost of risk, in relation to your guidance of 40 basis points, is there still a plausible downside to this guidance or does the 40 basis points encapsulate that plausible downside? And secondly, on loan growth, I know you're cautious on loan growth in the first half of twenty twenty four. We expect growth to pick up in half 2, but 2024 as a whole, can you just confirm that you expect net growth in the balance sheet?

Speaker 10

It sounds like you do because you earlier described volumes as a potential tailwind to NII? And could you narrow down how much lending we should expect for growth for this year? Thank you.

Speaker 1

Thank you. George, you want to take both of those?

Speaker 2

Sure. Thank you, Benjamin. So cost of risk of 40 basis points encapsulates everything we currently foresee in our balance sheet. We have not communicated a further plausible downside on the China commercial real estate portfolio booked in Hong Kong, because we believe at this stage that number 1, we're well provisioned for this portfolio after what's after the provisioning that's taken place last year. And number 2, we also have less concerns going forward on our residual exposure in that portfolio.

Speaker 2

I can point to our exposure is now at SEK 6,200,000,000 that's down SEK 3,100,000,000 from full year 2022. So therefore, we do not we have a reduced level of concern. I can walk you through if needed the how our ECL positioning is in this portfolio, but we're comfortable. No additional concerns than we caught out last year. On the loan growth, yes, our expectations is that as economic conditions continue improving and the interest rate environment becomes more supportive, we would expect to see loan growth.

Speaker 2

We continue to guide on a medium term basis to mid single digit percentage points, loan growth and balance sheet growth. It's very difficult to forecast what H2 will look like, but that is part of our projections.

Speaker 1

So I think our view is, given the shift in the interest rate cycle and the shift in inflation, we'll start to see more economic confidence or business confidence, consumer confidence in the second half. We're not expecting significant growth in the balance sheet in the first half. If you start to see that kick in the second half, you're unlikely to see full year mid single digit growth in 'twenty four. You're going to see a proportion of that start to kick in, in the second half of the year. And then you'll see it kicking in more strongly in 'twenty five and beyond.

Speaker 1

So I think in your modeling, you're probably looking at limited growth in the first half, growth starting to come back in the second half.

Speaker 4

Our next question comes from Robert Noble at Deutsche. Robert,

Speaker 9

hi. Hello. Can you hear me?

Speaker 2

Yes. Yes.

Speaker 9

Hi. Thanks for taking my questions. What was the size of the hedge last year? So how much is it that ramped up this year? And can you give us an idea of what the currency mix of the hedges and whether there's any duration differences between those currencies as well?

Speaker 9

Secondly, what exactly is in the quarter, the cash flow hedge reclassification, the impact it had from transferring from NII to non NII? What exactly was that? And then lastly, the timing of the Sebestel dividend post the Canada sale, will it come with Q1 results if the if the deal is announced prior to release or is it not linked to the results now at all? Thanks.

Speaker 1

Okay. George? Thanks, Norman. Thank you.

Speaker 2

So, Robert, we've added about $80,000,000,000 more north of $80,000,000,000 to our hedge this year in terms of bond notional, a little bit more in terms of other derivative notional. And that's on top of an SEK 80,000,000,000 we've added over Q4 and starting in Q3 in 2022. So that should give you an idea of also what is the quantum we could reasonably do in 2024 if the market conditions remain supportive for the hedge. In terms of duration, I mean, the kind of the obvious one to call out is we can certainly hedge on our weighted average life for slightly longer currencies such as the pound, the U. S.

Speaker 2

Dollar, to some extent the euro. We have an inability to hedge in any reasonable size or shape. And this is due to structural market, our Hong Kong dollar exposure. So our Hong Kong dollar exposure hedge would remain much lower, and therefore, our exposure in Hong Kong dollar would remain more sensitive to the rate outlook compared to the other currencies. In terms of Canada sale, you could expect in Q1 subject to completion, which is now I believe, which is now planned to be on track to be by the end of Q1, you would expect to see a jump of 1.2%, 1.3% in our CET1 ratio.

Speaker 2

The special dividend, which we're committed to consider, would happen afterwards. Our best estimate is H1, but frankly, afterwards as soon as we can subject to all necessary approvals. And that will drop the CET1 by about 0.5 with a result in net of around 0.8 in our CET1 after the dividends. We will update you at the Q1 results about the special dividend considerations.

Speaker 1

Yes. It's probably not possible to close at the end of March and declare in the same quarter just for accounting reasons. So it's likely to be closed at the end of Q1 and probably declare Q2 and then pay following that. That's likely to be the accounting requirement just to get the books closed for Q1 and then declare in Q2 is the most likely outcome.

Speaker 9

Sorry, declare in Q2, not with Q2 results?

Speaker 1

Probably with Q2 results.

Speaker 9

Right. So pay in Q3?

Speaker 2

It's our intent to do it as soon as we can. I can take you through the process, but there is a process we have to go through and the timelines will need to just flow through. But we'll confirm the timing at the 1Q results.

Speaker 9

All right. There was just that one little question of what the cash flow hedge reclassified in the quarter?

Speaker 2

Sorry. Yes, that reclassification is an error in reporting. It's related to one geography where some of our cash flow hedges were booked wrongly between NII and non NII, and we've done this correction. It is in it has affected 1 jurisdiction. The amount is a full year amount.

Speaker 2

So I wouldn't the $300,000,000 charge we've taken reflects a full year correction of which around a 4th relate to actually the Q4, the rest is a catch up for the 1st 3 quarters of the year.

Speaker 9

All right. Thanks very much.

Speaker 2

And sorry, just to be clear, Robert, the total income is not affected. This is just a reclassification of income from one line item to another line item.

Speaker 1

Got it. Thank you. Next question, please.

Speaker 11

Alastair Ward from Autonomous. Just a quick question on the ECL charges and things have subsided a bit on the China property side. Obviously, nice for you guys to see, but a few cracks popping up in Mexico. Is that something you characterize as cycle stuff that might be going somewhere from here we need to keep an eye on? Or something a little more one off?

Speaker 2

Thank you, Alastair. So the one off sorry, the Mexico ECL related to an increase in our activity, specifically in unsecured lending. It's a feature of that jurisdiction where margins are very healthy. But the ECL coverage or the ECL charge tend to be a bit higher. It will depend on our activity, but we expect to run at a slightly higher activity in unsecured lending, among other in Mexico than we were before.

Speaker 2

So I wouldn't look at it as a one off, but obviously it will depend on the cycle.

Speaker 1

But it's a function of doing business and growing the business as opposed to a function of a historic problem materializing.

Speaker 4

Next question, please. Our next question comes from Pearlie Maung at KBW.

Speaker 12

Thank you for taking my questions. Just a couple. And I guess the first one is cost. Just what can you do with cost in the falling rate environment because you've talked about management actions? I guess the reason I'm asking is because this year, I believe all in is about 7% year on year.

Speaker 12

And of course, it includes a lot of one offs like, levies in this quarter and SVB early in the year. But, on the basis that it crept up from plus 2% year on year, which is, I think, the first one you talked about 20, 3 guidance to, the end result being something like 6%, 7%. You know, just wondering what levers do you have in in your sort of cost management action pocket to to combat costs if revenue were to disappoint? So that's number 1. And the second question is, I think we will talk a lot about, you know, what might happen to to revenues in various rate environments.

Speaker 12

But, and also just thank you for the disclosures on the structural hedge. But I guess stepping back a little bit from that, just, you know, a couple of clarifications. So a falling rate environment, how would you expect, things like customer behavior to to respond? So things like deposit mix shift, like in Hong Kong. So I guess, the mix shift towards term happened quite a lot faster in Hong Kong versus the UK on the way up and is sort of still ongoing from the disclosures today.

Speaker 12

So, you know, if rates were to turn, would you expect that flip back to be pretty quick or, you know, we're still in a pretty high rate environment or do you still expect to make sure to continue? So or, you know, I think you you talked about, you know, things like capital markets might outperform in a falling rate environment. So I guess on an underlying basis, just how do you see that? Because capital markets and loan growth, etcetera, I guess a lot of it's also to do with with the underlying GDP as well. And there's still a lot of uncertainty sort of on the horizon.

Speaker 12

So even if rates were to come down, just how quickly do you think these benefits can come through?

Speaker 1

Okay. We'll tackle the cost first and then maybe we come to the revenue second, and I'll do a few introductory comments on how I see revenues. On costs, George, you want to just do a quick analysis of reported costs, 'twenty 3 versus 'twenty 2, target basis and then reported 23 to 4 on target basis. And I might just add a few comments at the end of that on cost levers, the way I look at it.

Speaker 2

George? Very good, yes. Thanks. So on a reported basis, 23% to 22%, we were down 1%. So the growth against our target of 6% also is reflective of the fact that a lot of the restructuring costs we've taken in 2022 did not repeat.

Speaker 2

We've guided how the costs have increased from our initial 2 or initial 3% where we included severance into the 6%. Obviously, the last percent this quarter was unexpected. The rules for the FDIC special assessment came in November. The earlier draft rules we've seen in September indicated we would be incurring that cost in 2024 and 2025, but the rules that came in November had us to have to had a different accounting treatment and accelerate all that as did all other banks who were subject to the FDIC special assessment. So just want to call it out that this one was a particular event we called out.

Speaker 2

We as we look at going forward for 2024, we're looking at a 5% on a target basis growth. This is excluding the cost reduction we will get from exiting the French retail business and the Canada business. Between the 2 of them, we will be exiting on an annual basis an equivalent of $1,000,000,000 just shy of that, which is around 3%. That would be a reduction in cost of 3%. But that is excluded from the way we're managing our target basis.

Speaker 2

Just explaining how we're coming up with this cost and then Noel can talk you through the levers to manage our cost. So first, there is this flow through inflation from 2023. There is some wage adjustments we need to take into account for 2024 based on the flow through inflation from 2023. That component we feel is easing and hopefully and the outlook of inflation will ease as we go out of 2024 into the future. There is continued spend in technology and continued investment in some of the growth areas, organic growth areas.

Speaker 2

That's particularly true in wealth. And those spending are partly offset by a number of cost management actions, some of which we have taken already, such as the severance program, which will have a flow through benefit in 2024 and other actions we're planning to take. Just before Noel talks to levers, we're looking at cost as in growth on the target basis in dollar numbers. We're not looking at our cost in a cost efficiency ratio basis. There may be fluctuation to our revenue, but frankly, in a year like 2023, our CER has dropped from 65% in 2022 to 48%.

Speaker 2

So we will tolerate some volatility on the CR as long as we're managing our cost in the spend dollar basis.

Speaker 1

But Thank you. I know this is an important topic, and let me reiterate upfront. We remain committed to cost discipline. The question is how are we achieving cost discipline? And we obviously look for efficiencies in the existing organization.

Speaker 1

We invest in tech to drive efficiencies in our processing costs, and we're continuing to do that. We invest in simplification of the portfolio, closing down businesses organically, exiting costs organically. But we're also exiting costs through M and A. And in our target basis, we adjust for that. But I don't want you to lose sight.

Speaker 1

We've exited we'll be exiting $1,000,000,000 of cost in 2024 as a function of M and A decisions, portfolio choices made for good strategic reasons. €300,000,000 of that was the exit of our French retail business. It's a business that was losing money. So we've exited £300,000,000 of cost by selling, and it's going to be profit accretive because that business was a loss making business. We've exited €800,000,000 of costs in Canada through selling.

Speaker 1

We hope to by the end of Q1, not tempting fate. Why are we doing it? Because that business in our hands was probably valued at around 1x book and we were able to generate 2.5x book as over 2.5x book. We sold it it because it was worth more to somebody else than to us and we're redistributing the proceeds of that to our shareholders because we thought it was the right answer for our shareholders. So we do internally generated cost efficiency and externally generated cost efficiency for good strategic reasons.

Speaker 1

And we'll continue to pull those levers. Now the other thing is we are we do believe an organization like us with the growth opportunities we have, we should invest. And we made a decision last year on our original cost target of 3% to actually move it to 4% because we were continuing to invest in tech. And in tech today as part of our overall cost base is now around 22%. When I took over 4 years ago, tech as a percent of our cost base was 16%.

Speaker 1

So we're trying to remain disciplined on cost and change the nature of the cost to be a much more strategic cost component in driving future enhancements for customer propositions and efficiencies. So that's sort of the thinking we have. You have our absolute commitment, both myself and George and the management teams. We will keep cost discipline. We'll invest and save at the same time.

Speaker 1

We have to acknowledge the flow through of inflation. But the other component we made a decision on in 'twenty three, given the very, very strong performance the business had, we thought it was right to go from 4% to 5% by topping up the variable pay pool by an extra percent. We thought that was the right decision for our people. So we think it's the right cost decision, but it has inflated our cost compared to our original target of 3%. But I think we had to do the right thing by our people on that.

Speaker 1

And then the final 1% taking us to the 6% number you talked about was unexpected. When we talked to you in Q3, we didn't expect that final 1% to come through for FDIC and bank levies. The FDIC is probably a timing issue. It was going to come through in 'twenty four or 'twenty five, but it actually surprisingly came through in the final quarter of the year. So you've got our commitment, Orem, maybe tight cost of living.

Speaker 1

Let us now turn to revenues. And let me maybe, again, decompose how we think about revenue growth outside of NII or interest income. Clearly, the great work that George and the team have done on hedging and the further structural hedges we put in place and the extra duration is a mitigant to the downside. I look at the opportunity on the upside in 2 components. 1 is our core USP of international banking.

Speaker 1

We have within our franchise clients who operate in more countries than we currently bank them, be they personal clients or corporate clients. We still have huge amounts of untapped opportunity to further penetrate that client base. And every time you saw in the revenue multipliers, we take a client to multiple jurisdictions, a revenue multiplier of 5 times domestic revenue in wholesale banking, 3 times domestic revenue in retail banking. That's an internal generated revenue opportunity not dependent on GDP. That's in our hands.

Speaker 1

The second revenue opportunity you talked about in your analysis is countercyclical. And I do believe I've been around 37 years, so I've seen some cycles. And I do believe lower inflation leads to lower interest rates. Lower interest rates lead to a pickup in economic activity, normally if the lag effect. And I do believe that pickup will have a positive impact on capital market activity in our Global Banking and Markets business.

Speaker 1

I think it will have a big and positive impact on demand for corporate lending and personal lending in our wholesale and retail business. Lag effect as I've talked about. And thirdly, I think consumers will start to shift out of cash into invested assets. And that's a huge opportunity for our wealth business. And you've seen our track record on our ability to attract net new invested assets over the last 3 years.

Speaker 1

£84,000,000,000 £80,000,000,000 £64,000,000,000 dollars That's where we're very focused and a lot of our investment is going. Now it's for us, the management team, to deliver on that. So we know we've got to deliver on tight costs and cost discipline, and we've got to deliver on revenue diversification. My final comment on this is I'm grateful that we've had 4 years of transformation because we now are through the majority of that transformation focus majority and we're now focused on that growth opportunity. And we're in a fortunate position that all of the hard work of the last 4 years has given us that platform for growth.

Speaker 1

Thank you.

Speaker 4

So we have time for one last question, then I'll hand it back to you, Noel, if you want to make any concluding remarks.

Speaker 1

Thank you.

Speaker 4

So our final question comes from Aman Rakaar at Barclays.

Speaker 3

Thank you very much. Hello, Noel.

Speaker 9

Hi, Amit. Hello, Neil.

Speaker 3

I have 2 broad questions. The first one is kind of split into 2. And then I've got a second question around GB and M. Sorry, capital returns. First broad question, it's around fee income.

Speaker 3

The first part of it is I'm a bit confused by your banking NII sensitivity. You can see in Slide 34, $3,400,000,000 on 100 basis points rate cut. But the majority of that comes from non banking sorry, non NII. So can you help me there? Because I just don't understand that.

Speaker 3

I thought banking NII II kind of stripped out the trading funding costs. So whatever color you can give us there. And the related question is that your outlook for fee income more broadly, I get your messaging around wealth and transaction banking is kind of demonstrating positive momentum. But can I ask you about the other big chunk fee income, which is GB and M? And there's various moving parts there.

Speaker 3

I suspect that you think cyclically it's not earning its full amount. But I also do note that Global FX has kind of been decent for a while. So can you give us your view on to what extent that business is operating at, below or ahead of kind of capacity? So that was a kind of broad 2 pronged question on fee income, believe it or not. The second question was around your distribution your approach to distribution.

Speaker 3

You're potentially facing down a barrel of slower volume growth in 'twenty four. And I'm interested in you're arguably then going to be more capital generative this year on still decent profits and not a lot of balance sheet growth. So how do you approach that? Do you kind of give us additional buybacks through the course of this year? Or do you kind of hold that powder dry for a bigger rebound in 'twenty five, say?

Speaker 3

Okay.

Speaker 1

I think, George, do you want to pick up those three points?

Speaker 2

Sure. Arman, so what historically we've been giving you is NII sensitivity. But as you know, there is a big component that is rate sensitive in our earnings, which doesn't sit in NII. It sits in non NII under funding cost of the trading book. And what we've been doing and hopefully that light was meant to clarify it, but I'm assuming now we have to take probably more offline with you to go through it.

Speaker 2

What we've been doing is showing the sensitivity of both the NII to rates as well as the sensitivity of the funding cost of trading book to rates. And then giving you the full sensitivity of banking NII to rates because that would be a better representation of how sensitive our earnings are to rate. And it will take away the noise that is created by ongoing commercial decisions on how much we how much funds we provide the trading activity or take away from the trading activity in year, it kind of cleanses that information out because it's just giving you the total that is relevant for our overall earnings. That sensitivity has reduced by more than half over the year, in part, at least for a 30%, 40% of it due to our structural hedging activity. With regards the fee income, you mentioned FX having a good and decent income.

Speaker 2

A couple of things about GB and M to call out. First, the PBT of GB and M was more than 20% or 25% higher year on year. So clearly a business that increases PBT. Its return on tangible equity has exceeded our cost of capital. It's something that has been not achieved for many years.

Speaker 2

It's above 12%. And to be also fair to GBLM, its return on tangible equity only increased by about 10% because there are some corporate center related adjustments which has affected them. Otherwise, the return on tangible equity could have followed the trend of PBT growth because their RWAs were down and they could have seen close to 20% and therefore well above their cost of equity. So we're comfortable with how the business is continuing to transform itself, focusing on their strength and adjusting their footprint. And that momentum continues.

Speaker 2

In terms of distribution, well, first, it remains our ambition to have a rolling series of share buybacks as long as our capital supports it and the outlook for capital does support it, but this remains subject to ongoing macroeconomic developments and regulatory approvals, etcetera. And one thing to call out with regards our bolt on acquisitions is when we look at an acquisition, obviously, the first parameter is making sure it's a strategic and accelerating growth area that we strategically want to grow. But the second parameter that we also use equally is that it is accretive compared to a share buyback. So we're making sure that when we go for a bolt on acquisition, the investments is more accretive than the investment in buying our own shares. And this is this would be a disciplined measure to make sure we're doing M and A that is both strategic and accretive.

Speaker 2

And finally, in terms of other parts of the distribution, 50% dividend payout ratio for 2024, which we reaffirmed. And then if you want to give a if you want to have a benchmark on where we would operate on a target basis, our CET1 ratio, it will be in the 14% to 14.5% range, which we reiterate, but we recognize we may not meet that target because we may be well above it for a few quarters, in particular, thanks to Canada, but also to our own capital generation.

Speaker 1

And the pace of which we can get back down to that target is going to be dictated by 2 things: the capacity of the market to take buybacks and second, other alternative uses of that capital to support growth. I think it's fair to say there's going to be excess of our CET1 over our target range more in the near term because probably the capacity of the market to take the volume of buybacks that could be done.

Speaker 3

Thank you so much. Can I just clarify, so is it reasonable then to expect that is it reasonable to target year on year growth in GB and M? The fee income businesses in GB and M, is it given those various moving parts, should we think about growth?

Speaker 2

Yes, in the strategic area, certainly, I mean, the areas we called out such as the foreign exchange, such as payments, such as supporting trade. We do expect also growth in, as Noel mentioned earlier, in capital market activity. If and when rates come down, we see progress in this area of the fee income space. Clearly, GB and M has focused itself and the kind of the message is that in the areas where they're focusing strategically, yes, in the areas where they have exited or are downsizing, then this would be non strategic areas that they will continue doing downsizing.

Speaker 3

Okay. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1

If I could Yes. Listen, I just wanted to say thank you all for joining. I also want to just say, look, I'm clearly, I'm really pleased that we've had a record profit year in 2023 and the best returns that we've had for a decade. Really pleased we were able to reward our Lyle shareholders with $19,000,000,000 of capital returns to our shareholders in respect to 2023. This included the best full year dividends since 2,008 and 3 share buybacks.

Speaker 1

We still expect to have substantial distribution capacity going forward. And we are committed to cost discipline. I want you in no doubt on that. We expect to have further opportunities to grow revenue, and we're very focused on it because we've come out of that full year of transformation phase with a very strong focus on growth. We continue to target a mid teens ROTE in 2024.

Speaker 1

And I just want to say thank you for joining us, and Neil and the team are available should you need them. I hope to see many of you here in Hong Kong in April when we hold our inaugural Global Investment Summit. Looking forward to being back here at the end of March and for the Investment Summit in early April. Thank you all very much. Thank you for coming.

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Earnings Conference Call
HSBC Q4 2023
00:00 / 00:00