HSBC to resume 35,000 job cuts

The FTSE 100 lender will also freeze almost all external recruitment, Chief Executive Noel Quinn told 235,000 employees in a memo seen by Reuters.

"We could not pause the job losses indefinitely - it was always a question of 'not if but when'," Quinn wrote.

Quinn announced the redundancy plan in February before getting the permanent CEO job as HSBC reported annual profit down by one third and wrote down more than $7bn (£5.6bn) of assets. He put the cuts on hold in March as the coronavirus pandemic mounted, saying it was the wrong time to cut workers' jobs.

In his memo Quinn said he was pressing on with the cuts as profit comes under greater pressure and forecasts indicate a difficult time ahead. He said he had asked senior managers to find cost cuts in the second half of the year.

Unite, one of the UK's biggest trade unions, said the time was still wrong to put workers out of jobs and that it would oppose any compulsory cuts in the UK.

Dominic Hook, Unite's national officer, said: "Since the start of the Covid-19 crisis colleagues across HSBC have worked tirelessly as key workers to ensure that consumers continue to access financial services. Now is the time for HSBC to stand by its workforce. The question that must be asked today is ‘Why now HSBC?’"

The pandemic prompted HSBC to set aside $3bn for bad debts in the first quarter and warn that further provisions were likely. The company is also under pressure from shareholders to improve performance after a chaotic period in which it scrapped the bank scrapped its dividend on the instructions of the Bank of England.

"The reality is that the measures and the change we announced in February are even more necessary today," Quinns said in his memo.