HSBC more than doubles pre-tax profits to $17.2 bn in 2017

Banking giant HSBC more than doubled pre-tax profit to $17.2 billion in 2017, it announced Tuesday, after a recovery drive to streamline its business and slash costs. Adjusted pre-tax profit also rose 11 percent year-on-year to $21 billion as revenue growth outweighed operating expenses, the bank said. The results came as new chief executive John Flint takes over from Stuart Gulliver, who steps down later Tuesday following seven years at the helm. Flint, who was previously head of retail banking and wealth management at HSBC, has said he wants to accelerate the pace of change at the bank. The Asia-focused firm has laid off tens of thousands of staff since 2015 as part of a wide-ranging overhaul that also saw it sell off its Brazil operations. The bank's strategy of expanding business in the Pearl River Delta, an area of southern China including major cities such as Hong Kong and Guangzhou, has also boosted performance. Gulliver said HSBC had concluded the transformation programme that it started in 2015 and described it as "simpler, stronger, and more secure" than it had been when he became chief executive. But chairman Mark Tucker warned that while the bank was optimistic about the global economy in 2018, rising international tensions and the threat of protectionism could be disruptive.