HSBC brought forward its key profitability target by a year and more than doubled its annual profits as expected bad loans from the Covid-19 pandemic failed to materialize and it looked forward to rising interest rates lifting its income.
Like global peers, HSBC, one of Europe's largest banks, is taking advantage of lower-than-expected impairment charges as its borrowers reap the benefit of government support packages in markets hit by the coronavirus pandemic, while a recovery in economies is also supporting firms.
The lender reported pretax profit came in at $18.9 billion last year, up from the previous year's $8.8 billion but just below the $19.1 billion average of 17 analyst estimates compiled by HSBC itself.
HSBC said it released $900 million in cash it had put aside in case pandemic-related bad loans spiked, as opposed to the same time a year earlier when it took a charge of $8.8 billion against expected losses.
"We have good momentum coming into 2022 and are confident that we can continue to execute against our strategy," Group Chief Executive Noel Quinn said in the results statement.
HSBC said it would buy back up to $1 billion of its own shares, after the conclusion of an existing $2 billion buyback program.
The bank said that if central bank interest rates rise worldwide as expected, the resulting improvement in its lending margins would mean it hits its goal of a double-digit return on equity in 2023, a year earlier than expected.
Quinn, who has run the bank on a permanent basis for the past two years, has doubled down on Asia and is investing billions of dollars in the lucrative wealth management business.
The results from the London-headquartered bank come after Standard Chartered raised its core profitability goals as it bets on inflation-battling rate increases to boost lending.
The bank reported revenue slipped 2% in 2021 due to low global interest rates and falling income in its markets business, but said rising rates policies this year and beyond should help to reverse the decline.
"After absorbing the impact of low interest rates for some time, we believe we have turned the corner on revenue," Quinn said.
On the downside, HSBC's performance was marred in the fourth quarter by a $500 million charge for expected credit losses, due in part to the downturn in China's troubled commercial real estate sector.
While Asia and most global economies open up, Hong Kong — HSBC's biggest market — is tightening restrictions as it grapples with a growing Covid-19 outbreak, stoking worries about the economic impact for banks and companies.