There’s no such ambiguity at HSBC. Shareholders wore the governance-flouting way it behaved during the last rounds of succession, which has seen boardroom stalwarts Stephen Green, Stuart Gulliver and Douglas Flint play musical chairs since Sir John Bond’s departure back in 2006. They won’t this time.
Although it’s hard to link financial performance directly with corporate governance, the lack of new blood at the top of HSBC can surely not have helped its failure to avoid helping Mexican drug dealers launder money, the FX rigging scandal and last month’s U-turn on freezing staff pay.
HSBC, one of the few banks whose top brass before and during the banking crisis remain in place, needs serious cultural change.
Outsiders must replace both Douglas Flint and Stuart Gulliver.
Shorters caught out?
The short-sellers betting against Berkeley Homes must be sweating. Founder Tony Pidgley has been calling the market pretty much right for three decades, calling the Nineties recession and stopping buying land in 2005 and 2006.
Today, despite high-profile short attacks by the likes of Odey Asset Management and Marshall Wace, Berkeley predicted results would be at the top end of expectations. Sales of £2 million-plus homes are flat, but given the stamp duty changes, that’s hardly carnage.
Fears of a property bubble in Battersea are growing (Picture: Getty Images)
Dan Kitwood/Getty Images
Looking ahead, while Pidgley has been moving some of his chips outside the capital, with land purchases in Ascot and Cookham, he is still buying plots in London.
There are good reasons to fear a major price correction in the new-builds of Battersea, but on these numbers, a wider crash seems unlikely.
