Revenues at Europe’s biggest bank ‘collapsed’ at the end of 2018 — and it’s blaming Trump’s trade war with China

HSBC

Annual results for Europe’s largest bank, HSBC, missed analyst expectations on Tuesday, with the bank’s CEO saying revenues "collapsed" at the end of 2018.
The bank saw revenues of $53.8 billion over the course of 2018, up 5% from 2017. But they were $1 billion below the analyst consensus: $54.7 billion.
"Growth rates are certainly lower on the balance sheet; we are seeing a softening in the asset side," HSBC CEO John Flint told the Financial Times. "Given the trade uncertainty, that’s not surprising, but, yes, we’re seeing a reduction in the rate of growth."
HSBC has a significant business in facilitating trade between Asia and the rest of the world, so the trade war is undoubtedly negative for the bank.

Annual results for Europe’s largest bank, HSBC, missed analyst expectations on Tuesday, with the bank’s CEO saying revenues "collapsed" at the end of 2018, and blaming ongoing trade tensions between the US and China.

The bank, which is headquartered in the UK but does a significant proportion of its business in Asia and emerging markets around the world, saw revenues of $53.8 billion over the course of 2018, up 5% from 2017.

But they were almost $1 billion below the analyst consensus: $54.7 billion.

Profits also missed expectations, hitting $19.9 billion, up 16% on 2017, but again around $1 billion lower than the $21.3 billion analyst consensus.

CEO John Flint, who was presiding over his first annual results at the helm of the lender, put much of that weakness down to the as yet unsolved trade battle between the world’s two largest economies.

"Growth rates are certainly lower on the balance sheet; we are seeing a softening in the asset side," Flint told the Financial Times. "Given the trade uncertainty, that’s not surprising, but, yes, we’re seeing a reduction in the rate of growth."

"Revenue collapsed in the last few weeks of the year and you don’t have any [cost] levers to pull in the final few weeks of the year," he added.

While trade discussions between China and the US seem to be progressing — President Donald Trump said over the weekend that the latest talks were "very productive" — the spectre of further tariffs is hanging over HSBC.

Flint said that the imposition of Trump’s threat of 25% tariffs against China would take the trade war’s impact to a "different order of magnitude."

Steve Clayton, a fund manager at Hargreaves Lansdown said: "HSBC has always been a bank built around facilitating international trade between Asia and the rest of the World. Today’s tariff spats between the US and China are hardly helpful and could begin to hurt the group’s customers in Asia and beyond."

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