LONDON: HSBC has revealed its quarterly profits have leapt by nearly a third as it nears the end of a US$2 billion cost-cutting programme, reported PA Media/dpa.
The banking giant said it had made bigger savings than it originally set out to do.
It reported a pre-tax profit of US$9.6 billion for the three months to September, which was 32 per cent higher than the same period last year.
This was driven by it getting more income from interest rates, lower expected credit losses and a smaller provision for legal costs than the same period last year.
HSBC also announced it would be handing up to US$1 billion to shareholders as part of a new share buyback scheme.
It comes as the bank revealed its operating expenses - meaning the day-to-day spending of a business, including salaries - were US$1.3 billion lower than the same time last year.
It follows a major cost-cutting drive kickstarted by chief executive Georges Elhedery in 2025, who set a target to reduce the cost base by around US$1.5 billion a year by the end of 2026.
HSBC said it had beaten this target with cost savings worth US$1.9 billion, which it expects to reach US$2 billion by the end of the year.
Chief financial officer Pam Kaur said the cost savings have come from "a range of places" including the "deduplication of roles" which particularly impacted more senior positions.
She also said the bank was encouraging its staff to build their AI skills and be "future ready."
"And that's so important for us because, in our judgment, what's most important for an AI strategy to work is to keep the human accountability, judgment and decision-making very much at the core of what we do," she said.
"So AI is there to help humans, not necessarily to replace humans.
"We know that AI will change how work is done across industries and of course it will impact some roles, it will transform other roles, while creating entirely new roles."
It comes as reports said the bank was preparing to cut jobs in its UK wealth management business as part of efforts to ramp up the use of AI to serve wealthy customers more efficiently, according to the Financial Times.
Kaur said she would not comment on the speculation about job losses but that the bank "absolutely focuses on the workforce we have, both in terms of skilling it and building on it."
Elhedery said: "Our performance shows that in a more complex world clients continue to turn to us to navigate uncertainty and seize new opportunities.
"It also reflects consistent execution of our strategic priorities with pace, precision and discipline.
"As we simplify HSBC, we are creating greater capacity to invest, grow and deliver strong returns for our shareholders."
© New Straits Times Press (M) Bhd