John Bond, group chairman of HSBC holdings,
showed great confidence in mainland's banking industry during
an exclusive interview with Xinhua in Hong Kong Monday.
Successful economy breeds successful bank,
and banks' performance represents the underlying economy.
Undoubtedly, China has a successful economy growing at a
fast pace, and China will also breed very successful banks,
Bond said.
He believes that Chinese economy will be
world's largest economy, "maybe in less than 25 years."
He also praised Chinese leadership for
their "amazing" managerial skill in handling economy
in the past 17 years.
HSBC's competing experience with some mainland
banks in Hong Kong, Singapore and other markets also tells
that some mainland banks are quite good, he said.
With the development of Chinese economy,
China will produce a lot of wealthy people, which will bring
great opportunities to mainland financial sectors and increase
the demand for financial services.
Based on all these factors, he said, HSBC has great confidence
in investing in mainland and has worked out a 25 year strategy
about mainland market.
Up to date, HSBC's investment in mainland has reached nearly
5 billion US dollars. Besides 19.9 percent stake of Bank
of Communication (before its initial public offering which
just began on Monday), mainland's fifth largest commercial
bank, HSBC also plans to increase its stake in Ping'an Insurance
Company, one of the leading insurance company in mainland,
to 19.9 percent. In the banking sector, HSBC has opened
10 branches, four sub-branches, and two representative offices
in the mainland.
According to Bond, HSBC is open in investing
in mainland but will do it well and properly. "We want
to make good investment and do any thing that will create
value for our shareholders," he said.
Commenting on the pains that mainland banks
are suffering today, he said this is because mainland banking
is transforming from a state planned economy to a more market
oriented one.
"It takes time to change, you can
not do it quickly," he said.
He urged mainland banks to build up "credit
culture" as top priority.
"You need credit analysis, independent
credit decision process, diversifying of loan portfolio"
if you want to be really successful in a market economy,
he said
.Source:Xinhua
