HSBC has opened a new flagship wealth center in Manhattan’s Hudson Yards as the bank repositions its wealth management and private banking business to cater to a global client base.
Over the last few years, HSBC shuttered 228 of 250 branch locations in the U.S. as it wound down its mass market retail banking business to focus on supporting multinational companies and wealthier families with cross-border banking and investment needs. HSBC now comprises a commercial bank serving companies with up to $2 billion in revenue, a global bank serving larger-cap, multinational corporations and institutions, the wealth and private banking business and a markets division that supports the other three with products “principally” around foreign exchange rates.
“We're one of the few banks that provide connectivity to our global wealth and private personal banking clients. No other bank can actually do that,” said Michael Roberts, CEO and Executive Director of HSBC North America Holdings.
Speaking during his first media roundtable as CEO at the unveiling of the new center adjacent to the bank’s U.S. headquarters in the Spiral building designed by Tishman Speyer, Roberts noted that HSBC has locations in 62 countries producing 90% of the world’s wealth.
“Obviously we're very well situated in Hong Kong, being the roots of the organization where we were founded 154 years ago,” he said. “But similarly, we have very significant operations both here in the Americas as well as in Europe and in the Middle East. And that really provides our ability to serve our clients in a very seamless way to look at all their financial needs.”
HSBC wealth clients have access to a wide range of foreign investments and are able to open accounts and lines of credit in other countries before ever setting foot there. The bank secures mortgages for international borrowers, takes care of international payments and global transfers and offers a multi-currency account that can be managed via app from anywhere in the world.
“Our wealth model is for an international client base,” said Racquel Oden, who was hired in September to lead the wealth and personal banking (WPB) division for HSBC US. “But we also have what I call a single relationship manager model.”
Oden said the goal was to create “one client continuum where you have all of banking, wealth management, private bank, ultra-high-net-worth all together.”
“Clients still need everyday banking,” she added. “So, within the wealth center, downstairs, we do have the ability for you to handle your banking needs, but we’ve spent a lot of time to ensure that we primarily focus on our ability to deliver advice and build spaces that allow for that one-on-one delivery of holistic advice from our relationship managers.”
The remaining 22 U.S. branch locations also are now serving as HSBC wealth centers.
While HBSC has been expanding rapidly in other parts of the world, with an emphasis on Asia, Roberts stressed that its stateside business remains vital.
“If you're going to create a global bank,” he said. “If you need, and are driven by, connectivity, where do you have to be? In the United States. Largest capital markets, largest destination for investments, the most sophisticated environment in the world. The toughest competitors in the world as well, which I always remind everyone.”
“If we have issuers of debt over a certain level, we have to come to the United States,” he explained. “If we help finance a transaction, say in Europe, if it goes over $5 billion worth, we have to finance in the United States. When we look at investors, whether it be a Saudi investor, whether it be a Hong Kong investor or an Indian investor, and they're looking for alternative investments, where do they come? The United States. So, the network doesn't work without the United States.”
Roberts also noted the U.S. produces some of the world’s largest companies and said HSBC US is “the largest exporter of revenue to our network.”
With more than $1.7 trillion under management, HSBC’s global WPB business serves around 38 million clients. Six million are international clients, including about 70% of 400,000 served in the U.S.
At the end of 2023, HSBC held a little more than $3 trillion in assets globally, with about $343 billion in North America. That’s slightly up from the previous year, according to Statista, but less than every other year since 2011.