MarketWatch: HSBC braces for bombshell

[marmar]

Trading in HSBC shares suspended in Hong Kong
By V. Phani Kumar, MarketWatch


HONG KONG (MarketWatch) -- Trading in shares of HSBC Holdings was suspended in Hong Kong on Monday at the banking giant's request, pending "the announcement of a corporate action," as the company was expected to reveal a pullback from its U.S. consumer lending business.

Trading in the shares is expected to resume Tuesday.

The banking giant is also due to announce its 2008 earnings report later in the day.

The Wall Street Journal reported that HSBC plans to curtail its foray into U.S. consumer lending by pulling back from key businesses.

The lender is largely throwing in the towel on its 2003 purchase of Household International Inc., a $14 billion deal that saddled it with a U.S. subprime lender that has seen its results worsen amid the housing downturn, the report said. .......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/Trading-HSBC-shares-suspended-Hong/story.aspx?guid=%7BD04F335E%2D6AAE%2D4E1A%2D856B%2D82A9C7C7B6FB%7D

[cliffordu]

1. Ouch. That'll leave a mark...

[spanone]

2. could be a bad monday

[dkf]

3. Hmm. Is this the beginning of the end of funding from Foreigners?

I can't say I blame them.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Well, what better places do they have to put their money?

[dkf]

5. I guess not in the American consumer.

They strayed from their Treasuries and look where it got them!

[Jackpine Radical]

9. Industries, real estate, etc. in the rest of the world

are at least as fucked as ours are.

Somehow I just don't see a banker burying a trillion dollars on a computer disk in his back yard.

[dkf]

10. The problem is that all the asset classes have suffered.

I guess that is why I've been hearing about storing gold lately.

[Jackpine Radical]

32. Yes, of course, many will do that. I expect the Arabs to be into gold

bigtime.

[HCE SuiGeneris]

6. As of 6:25 Pacific time... %'s are negative

http://finance.yahoo.com/intlindices?e=asia
Symbol Name Last Trade Change Related Info
^AORD All Ordinaries 3,205.70 9:24PM ET 91.20 (2.77%) Components, Chart, More
^SSEC Shanghai Composite 2,071.00 9:09PM ET 11.85 (0.57%) Chart, More
^HSI Hang Seng 12,528.49 9:10PM ET 283.08 (2.21%) Components, Chart, More
^BSESN BSE 30 8,891.61 Feb 27 0.00 (0.00%) Chart, More
^JKSE Jakarta Composite 1,285.48 Feb 27 0.00 (0.00%) Components, Chart, More
^KLSE KLSE Composite 890.67 Feb 27 2.75 (0.31%) Components, Chart, More
^N225 Nikkei 225 7,325.96 9:00PM ET 242.46 (3.20%) Chart, More
^NZ50 NZSE 50 2,483.79 9:04PM ET 38.53 (1.53%) Components, Chart, More
^STI Straits Times 1,552.40 9:10PM ET 42.47 (2.66%) Components, Chart, More
^KS11 Seoul Composite 1,029.74 9:05PM ET 33.29 (3.13%) Components, Chart, More
^TWII Taiwan Weighted 4,479.89 9:05PM ET 77.26 (1.70%) Chart, More

[Lex]

7. It was so stupid for them to buy a U.S. subprime lender.

Household was a dumb purchase it seems to me.

[TwilightZone]

8. It's not much of a bombshell.

Their withdrawal from US consumer lending is due to their horrible decision to acquire Household. Throwing in the towel on HH has been a forgone conclusion for some time now.

[PBS Poll-435]

11. Shit

This is not going to help the markets..

[Mike 03]

19. Shit is right. This is never going to stop...

Here comes another night with no sleep.

[MadMaddie]

12. HSBC and other companies like this brought this upon themselves

I have no sympathy for them. They wanted to get obscenely rich and to do that they ignored best practices and common sense. Yet these companies are "Too big to fail". If they are that big and they can impact the world then they must be broken up.
Yet these companies get 2nd, 3rd and 4th chances (bailouts) to continue with the same leadership and bad practices that landed them in the shit hill.

If you or I made similar decisions in our lives, we wouldn't be able to get decent jobs, loans etc because our credit rating would be damaged beyond repair.

[Renew Deal]

15. You have no idea what "they brought upon themselves."

There is no news yet.

[MadMaddie]

18. If they are suspending their trading in shares

it does not bode well for them. We may not know how much trouble they are in until Monday but we can say for sure they are in trouble. Again they bought into the Sub-Prime fiasco and they have gotten burned like every other company.

<snip>
Trading in shares of HSBC Holdings was suspended in Hong Kong on Monday at the banking giant's request, pending "the announcement of a corporate action," as the company was expected to reveal a pullback from its U.S. consumer lending business.
<snip>

[Renew Deal]

20. I saw that.

I heard that they took a hit with Madoff too. But this sounds more like some sort of scandal. There are bad numbers somewhere.

[TwilightZone]

21. The article explains their reasoning.

They're throwing in the towel on Household. This is not a surprise. It was doomed from the beginning.

[sailor65]

13. Has anyone else here noticed

HSBC's quiet yet huge expansion? Two years ago, one of my five credit cards was under the HSBC umbrella. Today, four of the five are owned by HSBC, as well as two non-revolving accounts.

[Renew Deal]

14. I have a friend at HSBC.

He's a really nice guy. I think he works in real estate. We talked the other day. He said that they've been busy and things seemed to be OK. There wasn't alot of bad news except some money was indirectly invested with Madoff. I hope for him and many others that this doesn't affect them in a bad way. We'll see.

[alcibiades_mystery]

16. The behavior of Direct Merchant's Bank (now HSBC) is so egregious

That I take a simple pleasure in watching the American consumer essentially stick it to these idiots by non-consumption and default.

HSBC consumer credit is predatory lending. Fuck 'em with a stick.

[janx]

22. I owe them money and can't pay them.

What was six grand last year is now eight grand. The interest rate went up so fast that it made my head spin. I'm going to Consumer Credit Counseling with this one.

[Donnachaidh]

23. OMG -- I didn't make that connection!

Direct Merchant's Bank? I agree with you - F*CK them.

[Mike 03]

17. Here we go.

This economic crisis is a disaster. It's hard to even sleep anymore...

[Gman]

24. So is this the beginning of the long awaited shoe drop of consumer credit?

Is this the credit card house of cards now starting to come down? THis needs to happen before we can even think about recovery.

[X_Digger]

25. They're already out of car lending.

I got a notice last August that the car loan side of the house was closing up shop- they're servicing existing loans, but no new ones.

[Snarkoleptic]

26. Bloomberg is reporting that HSBC will try to sell $18billion in new stock to bolster it's capital.

Good luck with that....

[MindMatter]

27. To the Treasury, probably

[PBS Poll-435]

28. Yep

The infamous TCPP.

HSBC actually needs it.

[janx]

36. So taxpayer money will bail them out again?! n/t

[spanone]

29. the foreign markets are taking a whooping....down almost 4%

[truebrit71]

30. This coupled with the AIG losses coming out tomorrow along with their request/demand for even more $

..and continuing rumours about Shittygroup and Wank of America collapsing it could be another Black Monday...

[dkf]

33. AIG, Citi and BOA are hardly worth anything anyway.

Thank goodness they are already trashed and can't fall much more.

[truebrit71]

34. The price of their stock can't go much lower, but the impact of their failed business plan..

..will reverberate throughout the world markets..

[HCE SuiGeneris]

35. It already is a Black Monday in Asia...

http://finance.yahoo.com/intlindices?e=asia

[CountAllVotes]

31. HANG SENG INDEX (HKSE: ^HSI) Down 503.58 (3.93%) right now

Not good folks. Not good at all!

:dem: :kick: