HSBC share price closes lower after revealing plans to cut 25,000 jobs – 8,000 of which are in the UK

Shares in HSBC closed just short of one per cent lower, at 613.74p, after it announced plans to cut 25,000 jobs as part of a move to strip out $5bn (£3.25bn) worth of costs from Europe's biggest bank. 

 

 

Shares had opened slightly higher on the news, but began to fall back as the morning drew on. 

 

Of the total number of redundancies, 8,000 are expected to come from positions in the UK. The layoffs will affect both the retail and investment banking arm. 

 

The group said: "HSBC is now undertaking a significant reshaping of its business portfolio. It is redeploying resources to capture expected future growth opportunities and adapting to structural changes in the operating environment."

 

In total, HSBC will make a like-for-like reduction of 10 per cent of the 266,000 workforce, according to chief executive Stuart Gulliver. The bank will also sell businesses in Turkey and Brazil, which will effectively double the headcount being cut back to around 50,000. 

 

"We recognise that the world has changed and we need to change with it. That is why we are outlining the following… strategic actions that will further transform our organisation," he said in a statement.

 

HSBC has also confirmed that it is still reviewing whether to move its headquarters out of the UK, and will make a decision by the end of 2015. It is thought the bank could relocate its headquarters to Hong Kong.

 

 

It has also set a new target for return on equity to more than 10 per cent by 2017, down from the previous target of 12 per cent to 15 per cent by next year.

 

And the bank is planning an overhaul of IT systems, cutting the number of software applications used and moving to more cloud-based platforms.

 

This will result in China and India accounting for 75 per cent of software engineering, up from 50 per cent currently, which is expected to save up to $525m.