HSBC India profit at $1bn for 1st time

Mumbai: HSBC has said its profits before tax from India crossed $1 billion for the first time in 2019. According to the bank’s results announced on Tuesday,The pre-tax profits from India rose 22% to $1.01 billion from $825 million in the previous year. This was even as the bank reported a pre-tax loss of $4.6 billion in Europe and $3.3 billion in the UK.
Retail banking and wealth management contributed $48 million to its Indian profit, which is more than double of 2018’s $20 million. Commercial banking made up $181 million, 27% higher than $143 million in 2018. Global banking grew 20% to $466 million from $387 million in 2018, while profits from corporate centre rose 13% to $311 million from $275 million.
Despite the increase in profits, India’s ranking fell from third position to fourth. Hong Kong contributes most of the bank’s profits followed by mainland China. In 2019, Saudi Arabia, which saw the world’s largest IPO, overtook India to become the third-largest market with a pre-tax profit of $1.2 billion.
The number of customer accounts in India grew to 14,935 in 2019 as against 14,210 in the year-ago period.
“Our businesses in Mexico, India, the ASEAN region and mainland China also performed well. The biggest areas of under performance were our businesses in the US and our European non-ring-fenced bank, both of which saw a reduction in revenue and profit before tax,” the report said.
HSBC’s overall tax payments in India increased to $398 million from $384 million in the year-ago period.