HSBC: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

HSBC Holdings PLC is one the largest banking groups in the world. It is headquartered in London, with its head office based in the HSBC Tower, London, a part of the Canary Wharf development in the London Docklands. Its founding member is The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited, a bank established by the Scot Thomas Sutherland to finance trade in the Far East in 1865.

The bank is the largest banking conglomerate after Citigroup. It reports in US dollars as seventy per cent of its earnings come from outside the UK.

The bank's logo, an elongated hexagon shape, is an agglomeration of three symbols: the Scottish origin of Thomas Sutherland (the saltire/cross in the centre), the red colour symbolising China, and the triangles at the side symbolising the bank being "open for business".

Activities in the United Kingdom

HSBC is one of the Big Four banks in the United Kingdom. Its shares form one of the largest components of the London Stock Exchange. In traditional City jargon the bank is known as "Honkers and Shankers".

HSBC owns Hang Seng Bank after which the Hang Seng Index for stock prices in Hong Kong is named; it is one of the three banks which issues banknotes for Hong Kong (the other two being the Bank of China and Standard Chartered Bank).

The Hong Kong headquarters of the bank are in Central, Hong Kong, in the HSBC Tower, designed by the British architect Norman Foster.

HSBC established its Shanghai branch office on the 3rd of April, 1865. Aside from the period 1941-1945, in which Japanese aggressors forced HSBC and other foreign-invested banks to leave the local market, it has had a continuous presence in the city. HSBC was historically housed in one of the largest and most impressive buildings on The Bund, Shanghai's boulevard formerly known as the Wall Street of the Orient. In April 1955, HSBC handed over this office to the Communist government, and its activities were continued in rented premises. Its activities were mainly in inward remittances and export bills until the economic reforms of the late 1970s. Chinese authorities had offered to lease HSBC its old headquarters on The Bund in 1995 but the offer was turned down. Currently HSBC is located in its own HSBC Tower across the river in the Pudong area of Shanghai.

On 6 Aug 2004, HSBC announced to pay US$1.75 billion for a 19.9% stake in Shanghai-based Bank of Communications. At the time of the announcement, Bank of Communications was China's fifth-largest bank and the investment by HSBC was eight times bigger than any previous foriegn investment in a Chinese bank. Industry considered this move giving HSBC a lead in the race to grab pieces of the China's banking market. A year earlier, HSBC had paid US$63 million for a 8% stake in Bank of Shanghai and US$733 million for a 10% stake in Ping An Insurance.

HSBC has a strong presence in overseas Chinese communities especially in Vancouver and Toronto in Canada. HSBC (Canada) is the only Canadian bank with headquarters in British Columbia. It also opened some branch offices in the USA. There was a branch office on the ground floor of the World Trade Center in New York.

• 1865 - The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited is established in Shanghai to finance the growing trade between China and Europe. It is incorporated in Hong Kong by special dispensation from the British Treasury under the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank Ordinance 1866.
• 1959 - acquisition of The British Bank of the Middle East and the Mercantile Bank (based in India).
• 1965 - Purchase of a controlling interest in Hang Seng Bank of Hong Kong.
• 1980s - Move into Canadian and Australian markets.
• 1991 - HSBC Holdings is established; shares are traded on the London and Hong Kong stock exchanges.
• 1992 - acquisition of Midland Bank of Birmingham the United Kingdom.
• 1997 - acquisition of Roberts S.A. de Inversiones of Argentina.
• 1999 - acquisition of Republic New York; shares are traded on a third stock exchange, the NYSE, as American Depositary Receipts or ADRs.
• 2000 - acquisition of Crédit Commercial de France; shares are traded on a fourth stock exchange in Paris.
• 2001 - acquisition of Demirbank TAS of Turkey.
• 2002 - acquisition of Grupo Financiero Bital, S.A. de C.V. of Mexico.
• 2003 - acquisition of Household International of the United States.
• 2004 - acquisition of The Bank of Bermuda Limited of Bermuda; shares are traded on a fifth stock exchange in Bermuda; acquisition of Marks and Spencer Retail Financial Services Holdings Ltd.; acquisition of 19.9% of the Bank of Communication of Shanghai, China.

On November 20 2003, a bomb blast in Istanbul destroyed the bank's head office in Turkey causing several deaths and hundreds of injuries.