The rise of a great power: starting with military industry

Chapter 797 HSBC’s Dilemma

No. 1 Queen's Road Central, Hong Kong.

The fourth generation HSBC Hong Kong Head Office Building, designed by the famous architect Norman Foster, stands in the most prosperous core area of ​​Central!
This 180-meter-high, 46-story building is one of the most expensive buildings in the world to date, with a total construction cost of up to US$10 billion.

The HSBC headquarters building is not the tallest building in Hong Kong, but its architectural style is unique. It does not use the traditional layer-by-layer pouring method, but uses a prefabricated structure. If necessary, HSBC can dismantle the entire building in a short time and transport it to other places to reassemble it into a skyscraper.

To use the words of a Hong Kong newspaper that mocked HSBC before, people who deal with money really know how to be thrifty. When HSBC wants to abandon Hong Kong in the future, it will not leave even a brick or a tile behind, which is the highest level of "capitalism"!
Under the influence of public opinion, the head office building, which was supposed to show the strong financial strength of HSBC, has become the strongest evidence that HSBC has no intention of taking root in Hong Kong. How can a bank that is unwilling to stay here win the lasting trust of local users in Hong Kong?
Originally, HSBC was the largest bank in Hong Kong due to its unquestionable strength in the Hong Kong financial sector, but now HSBC ranks only seventh in Hong Kong.

Yes!

From 1982 to 1992, it took only ten years for HSBC to grow from the largest and most powerful bank in Hong Kong to the seventh largest bank in Hong Kong today.

Currently, the bank ranking order recognized by the industry in Hong Kong is: Hong Kong Bank, Standard Chartered Bank, Hong Kong Construction Bank, Hong Kong Commercial Bank, Hong Kong Development Bank, and Hong Kong Everbright Bank.

The second is Standard Chartered Bank.

The top six banks have developed at an astonishing speed in the past decade. With Hong Kong as their base, they have vigorously expanded the mainland market and extended their tentacles to Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, Africa, and South America. They now even have branches in Europe and the United States.

But HSBC encountered difficulties.

HSBC was in an unfavorable situation in the overall environment. In addition, the fact that HSBC has its headquarters in London and the constant news that HSBC is going to run away caused HSBC to suffer great trouble in its business.

HSBC also coveted the mainland financial market, but was unable to enter.

Pu Weishi was sitting in his spacious and bright office. Through the glass curtain wall, he could see the beautiful sea view of Victoria Harbour in the distance. But at the moment, he was frowning and had no time to appreciate the scenery outside the window.

The current predicament of HSBC has put him under tremendous pressure.

In recent years, the label of "capitalism" that some Hong Kong media have put on HSBC is not groundless, because HSBC has been following the established steps to gradually shift its development focus away from Hong Kong.

For example, after HSBC acquired a stake in the US Haifeng Bank in 1980, it further acquired it as a wholly-owned subsidiary in 1987. Even after the failure of the acquisition of the Royal Bank of Scotland in 1981, HSBC's interest in acquiring large banks in the UK has never diminished, and it eventually acquired equity in the British Middle East Bank and Midland Bank.

As early as that year, HSBC's board of directors passed a resolution that HSBC would establish a new holding company based on the group. Without relocating the group's headquarters, the newly established holding company would directly return to the UK for registration, and then place the HSBC Group under the name of the new holding company. The overall asset transfer of the HSBC Group would be achieved through operations such as issuing new shares and overseas listings.

This is what HSBC planned and did.

However, there is no wall that is impenetrable. After the HSBC plan was announced, it caused an uproar and completely triggered negative public opinion against HSBC in Hong Kong society, thus causing an immeasurable and serious blow to HSBC's development.

This blow continues to this day.

Originally, although Hong Kong was just a small place, it was the most important source of profit for the entire HSBC Bank. But now HSBC Group has no profit in Hong Kong.

HSBC is feeling enormous pressure, especially from other banks.

Look at those banks, they use computers for office work, pursue paperless office, open Internet services as soon as possible, and set up ATM machines one by one.

Then office efficiency and market share competitiveness will be greatly improved.

Pu Weishi frowned. HSBC was in a bad situation, and it put him under great pressure because shareholders only cared about profit distribution and didn't care about any difficulties he encountered or what caused them. Pu Weishi, the boss, had to solve any difficulties. In comparison, his predecessor Shen Bi had a much better life.

"Oh~~" Pu Weishi sighed deeply.

The competitors are developing rapidly and becoming stronger. There was already a huge gap in strength between the two sides, let alone now.

If this continues, HSBC will have no chance of development, and even survival will be a problem.

The largest proportion of HSBC's total deposits now comes not from companies or ordinary personal deposits, but from some wealthy and middle-class people who deposit a portion of their money in HSBC in the hope that it will be easier to withdraw the money when they immigrate.

But this was not enough to get HSBC out of its predicament.

"Is HSBC really going to be sold to the Chinese business consortium?" Pu Weishi was very unwilling.

Over the years, many Chinese business groups have tried to acquire HSBC, but have been repeatedly rejected.

As a British bank, HSBC still retains the last bit of British pride.

The British would never be willing to sell HSBC unless they were completely desperate.

Thinking about the fact that Liu Tao invited him to dinner, Pu Weishi felt even more pressured.

Although Liu Tao rarely appears in the news in Hong Kong, everyone in the upper class is aware of his existence.

The resources this person can mobilize in Hong Kong are so terrifying that it is unimaginable.

He is the chairman of the board of directors of the top six banks in Hong Kong. He controls all of Hong Kong's ports, electricity and communications.
It’s not like Pu Weishi hasn’t met Liu Tao before, but every time Liu Tao gives him a lot of pressure.

Others would look up to the British, but Liu Tao always gave him the impression of looking at the British at eye level, or even looking down on them.

Whenever the British people who know the situation mention this man, they can't help but grit their teeth, because the biggest reason why the British Expeditionary Force suffered such heavy losses in the Falklands War was the "Eagle Strike" anti-ship missile.

Without the Eagle Strike anti-ship missiles, the British Expeditionary Force would not have suffered such heavy losses.

Not to mention, in 1982, Liu Tao took advantage of the cold winter sweeping across Hong Kong and bought stocks at low prices. The British in Hong Kong suffered heavy losses that time.

In order to leave quickly, assets worth HK$100 million at that time were often sold for less than one-third of the price.

The assets of foreign companies such as Jardine Matheson and Co. came into Liu Tao's hands in this way.

In fact, it was Panshan Group's investment and factory construction that led to a major change in Hong Kong's economic fundamentals and a subversive transformation of the entire industrial structure.

Because of this, HSBC is in a passive position.

(End of this chapter)