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HSBC is in talks to award chief executive Georges Elhedery a pay package of as much as £15mn, almost six months after he was appointed and embarked on a significant cost-cutting drive at the bank.
Under the plans, Elhedery’s fixed pay would be halved while that tied to performance would be able to be increased significantly, according to a person briefed on the matter.
The Lebanese-born banker was given a total pay package worth £10.5mn when he took on the top job in September, including a base salary of £1.4mn.
No final decision has yet been made on Elhedery’s pay discussions, which were first reported by Sky News.
HSBC and other UK lenders have more leeway on how to compensate some of their high-risk takers after the UK government’s decision to scrap a cap on banker bonuses in 2023, put in place when it was still part of the EU.
Barclays has also proposed a remuneration overhaul for its chief executive CS Venkatakrishnan that would see his fixed pay cut from £2.95mn to £1.59mn but make him eligible for bonuses and long-term stock options worth up to eight times his new salary.
Elhedery has embarked on a significant restructuring of HSBC over the past five months in an effort to simplify the bank and cut costs. That includes a merger of its commercial and investment banking units as well as a decision to wind down key parts of its investment banking business in the UK, Europe and the Americas.
Christina Ma, HSBC’s head of global banking for Asia Pacific, is to leave the bank after less than two years.
Ma, who spent more than two decades at Goldman Sachs and became a partner there in 2020, is departing HSBC as Elhedery’s restructuring kicks in. Ma led Goldman Sachs’ Greater China equities business before moving to the London-headquartered bank. Her exit was first reported by Bloomberg News. Ma did not immediately respond to a request to comment made outside working hours.
HSBC has indicated there will be a significant number of job cuts as part of the restructuring but has not provided a specific number.
A £15mn sum would make Elhedery’s pay significantly higher than that of his predecessor Noel Quinn, whose total pay package in 2023 — his last full year at the bank — was worth £10.6mn. That was almost double what he had received a year earlier, thanks largely to a long-term incentive plan vesting. Quinn’s base salary was £1.4mn in 2024.
HSBC declined to comment on Elhedery’s pay and Ma’s departure.
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