HBCYF - HSBC Holdings plc. (HSBC) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript
2024-02-21 07:07:05 ET
HSBC Holdings plc. (HSBC)
Q4 2023 Earnings Conference Call
February 21, 2024, 02:45 AM ET
Company Participants
Noel Quinn - Group CEO
Georges Elhedery - Group CFO
Conference Call Participants
Gurpreet Sahi - Goldman Sachs
Andrew Coombs - Citi
Katherine Lee - JPMorgan
Joseph Dickerson - Jefferies
Benjamin Toms - RBC
Robert Noble - Deutsche
Alastair Warr - Autonomous
Aman Rakkar - Barclays
Presentation
Unidentified Company Representative
Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the Investor and Analyst Webinar for HSBC Holdings plc’s 2023 Annual Results. For your information, this webinar is being recorded.
At this time, I will hand over to Noel Quinn, Group Chief Executive
Noel Quinn
Good afternoon for those in Hong Kong and great to see you all. Good morning to those watching in London and around the world. Before Georges takes you through the Q4 numbers, I'll make some opening comments.
First, I'm really pleased with the performance that the team delivered in 2023. We reported $30 billion of PBT for the first time ever and we delivered a return on tangible equity of 14.6% or 15.6% excluding material notable items.
Second, there were some items in the fourth quarter, which make it harder to understand the underlying performance. Georges will take you through them in detail. But I want to stress there was still good underlying growth in the fourth quarter excluding the impact of notable items and Argentina hyperinflation our profit before tax was $7.3 billion.
Third, we distributed $19 billion of capital returns to our shareholders in respect of 2023. This included a full-year dividend of $0.61 per share which is the highest since 2008 and $7 billion of share buybacks which have reduced the share count by over 4% at completion of the current buyback.
Fourth, we still expect to have substantial distribution capacity going forward. We've announced a further share buyback of up to $2 billion. We're committed to considering a special dividend of $0.21 per share as a priority use of the Canada proceeds subject to the completion of the transaction, and we finished the year with a strong CET 1 ratio of 14.8% which will be further boosted by the Canada deal.
Fifth, we remain committed to cost discipline. We have flow through impact of 2023 inflation on our costs this year but expect a downward trend in inflationary pressures in 2025 and beyond. We continue to invest in growth opportunities and the digitization of our business to drive incremental efficiencies. We remain very focused on funding much of that investment through cost saving initiatives.
Finally, we expect to have further opportunities to grow revenue even in a lower rate environment. Georges will take you through how we're reducing our sensitivity to rate movements and we do acknowledge the downside risks to NII, but we're confident that we have the levers for growth that allow us to deliver mid-team returns in 2024....
HSBC Holdings plc. (HSBC) Q4 2023 Earnings Call Transcript