HSBC shareholder Standard Life would back moving headquarters

A number of major asset managers have said they would support HSBC Holdings PLC should the bank decide to move its headquarters to Hong Kong amid increasingly onerous regulation on the sector in the United Kingdom, the Financial Times reported.

On 1 December, the Bank of England will publish the results of its latest bank stress tests, including their ability to cope with a downturn in China’s economy and other emergency markets.

Speaking on the Today programme, Cumming said: ‘Logically, we would be supportive of a move if they chose to do that’.

It has previously considered re-locating to America and Hong Kong. Standard Life now has a 1% shareholding in HSBC.

Originally, HSBC said it would make a decision on any move by year’s end, but there have been signs recently that the task force weighing up the situation might not make its recommendation to the board until early next year.

HSBC has already announced that it is to relocate the head office of its United Kingdom retail bank from London to Birmingham by 2018 ahead of new ring-fencing rules separating the operation from riskier investment banking.

With Asia now accounting for more than three-quarters of the bank’s profits, some observers believe the massive cost of moving the headquarters could be quickly recouped.

Earlier this year ratings agency Moody’s Investors Service warned moving headquarters would draw “considerable management attention away from normal business”.

There are reports that the chancellor George Osborne may offer further incentives for banks to remain domiciled in the United Kingdom on in the autumn budget and comprehensive spending review on Wednesday.

‘But I think this ongoing process of continually… moving the goalposts and with the Financial Policy Committee coming up with new wheezes in terms of getting the banks to hold more capital – I think HSBC are very, very close to losing patience with this never ending process’. It threatened to quit the country if the government made a decision to break up banks in 2010.