HSBC is planning to ditch its massive Canary Wharf headquarters for a smaller office in the City of London.
The banking giant will up sticks from the 45-floor skyscraper, which has been dubbed the ‘Tower of Doom’ by some staff, towards the end of 2026.
The rise of home working following the pandemic has left swathes of empty desks in offices in towns and cities around the world, including the UK.
With many firms seeking less space, HSBC is aiming to move to Panorama St Paul’s, the redeveloped former offices of telecoms group BT in the Square Mile.
‘Panorama offers a modern office environment in the City, well-connected to major transport links and amenities,’ the bank said.
Downsizing: HSBC is to leave its 45-floor Canary Wharf skyscraper (pictured) - which has been dubbed the tower of doom by staff - towards the end of 2026
HSBC shares rose 0.3 per cent, or 1.9p, to 604.1p.
The decision is a huge blow to Canary Wharf, where HSBC has been based since 2002 when it corralled its retail, business, corporate and investment bankers into the tower from various offices across London, at the cost of nearly £1billion.
Officially known as 8 Canada Square, the towering steel and glass edifice was designed by British architect Norman Foster, the brains behind other notable London landmarks including ‘The Gherkin’ skyscraper in the City.
His company also designed Apple’s sprawling headquarters in California, US.
The HSBC tower houses around 8,000 employees across nearly 1.8m square feet of office space.
The bank’s new site in the City is a 556,000-square- foot premises.
In 2007, HSBC sold the tower to Spanish property firm Metrovacesa in a deal that made it the first building in Britain to fetch more than £1billion.
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The bank bought the property back in 2008 when Metrovacesa faced financing issues during the global recession.
It was then sold in 2009 to a South Korean pension fund before being acquired by its current owner, the Qatari government’s sovereign wealth fund, in 2014.
But the bank’s shift to Panorama comes as firms look to cut back on their real estate costs. The rise of home working means staff are spending less time in the office.
In 2021, the bank’s boss Noel Quinn scrapped an executive floor on the 42nd floor, claiming it was ‘empty half the time’ as HSBC bigwigs frequently criss-crossed the globe to manage its operations.
The news of the move was greeted with elation in the City and touted as a sign of the Square Mile’s ongoing status as a major global financial centre.
‘HSBC’s decision to return here to the heart of the City of London is a huge vote of confidence,’ said Chris Hayward, policy chairman of the City of London Corporation.
‘This move further solidifies the City’s reputation as a prime destination for financial services firms. We are confident that HSBC will thrive and find great success.’
But the decision is likely to raise further questions about the future of Canary Wharf as owners – the Qatar Investment Authority and Canadian asset manager Brookfield – look to wean the area off its reliance on major investment banks amid a drought of global dealmaking.
Several projects are being drawn up to broaden its appeal, including plans for an 820,000-square- foot laboratory tower, which is designed to lure life sciences companies to the area.
There are also proposals to build student accommodation and residential flats as well as revamp the Middle Dock area of the site to introduce more green space and leisure areas to attract recreational visitors.
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The banking giant is to move out of 8 Canada Square
8 Canada Square
8 Canada Square (commonly referred to as the HSBC Tower, or the “Tower of Doom” by some HSBC employees) is a 45 floor skyscraper in Canary Wharf, London. The building is the global headquarters of the HSBC Holdings.
by 2027 when its current lease expires, after two decades. The move is part of plans to downsize its office space following the Covid-19 pandemic, as the bank says it is now committed to flexible working.
HSBC could have decided to cut costs by moving to a business park on the outskirts of London. But they didn't. Instead, the bank justified the move to be “well-connected to major transport links and amenities” and “a more convenient location for employees”.
Those at the big institutions sticking it out in the district argue that the economies of scale leave them with little alternative. With thousands of staff and no working from home allowed, it's not so easy to swap a Canary Wharf skyscraper for a historic building in the City.
The original Canary Wharf estate has become a poster child for the problems facing office landlords. Aging buildings, the new demands of flexible work and a banking industry upended by the global financial crisis have led to a steady drumbeat of shrinking demand and departing tenants over the past months.
November 14, 2023 | 5:08 P.M. HSBC has exchanged to let its new London headquarters, relocating from the more than 1 million square foot it has occupied in Canary Wharf for more than two decades, to 556,000 square feet at the former British Telecom head office near St Paul's Cathedral in the City of London.
HSBC is among the many banks to close bank branches, shutting 114 of its locations in 2023. HSBC said the decline of in-branch banking has accelerated so much since the COVID-19 pandemic that some branches which are set to close serve fewer than 250 customers a week.
Shares of HSBC Holdings fell over 3% in Hong Kong on Friday after reports that its top shareholder Ping An Insurance might be looking to cut its stake in the British bank. Despite the fall, HSBC's share price is still at its highest since August 2018, trading at about 68 Hong Kong dollars per share.
It modified its planning laws to expand the provision of new offices in the City of London, for example, creating offices above railway stations (Blackfriars) and roads (Alban Gate). The resulting oversupply of office space contributed to the failure of the Canary Wharf project.
It is not known what HSBC's tower, owned by Qatari investors, will be used for when the bank moves out. The Canary Wharf Group, which owns and runs the estate, has not commented on HSBC's move but said the area had become more diverse in recent years.
Canary Wharf is surprisingly peaceful, as the district is free from major roads and the DLR is very quiet. 17. Canary Wharf is one of London's greener areas; there are some fantastic parks, particularly to the south, and Jubilee Park is effectively a roof garden built above an underground station. 18.
Considering Canary Wharf is host to a variety of financial giants including Barclays, Citigroup, HSBC, J P Morgan, KPMG and Thomson Reuters - with more than 105,000 people working in the area - the natural progression has been for Canary Wharf to evolve as a thriving residential arena where professionals can live, work ...
Moody's Corp. is moving its London headquarters from offices in Canary Wharf to a new location in the City of London, adding to the wave of financial firms that have opted to leave the Docklands district.
HSBC is to move out of its global headquarters in Canary Wharf after more than two decades to considerably smaller offices in the City of London, in response to post-pandemic hybrid working arrangements and a cost-cutting drive.
These reports proved true; on May 26, 2021, HSBC announced that it would abandon the United States retail market as part of a pivot to Asia. In April 2022, Citizens Bank completed the acquisition of 80 branches from HSBC in New York City, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia, and Florida.
HSBC Holdings plc (Chinese: 滙豐; acronym from its founding member The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) is a British universal bank and financial services group headquartered in London, England, with historical and business links to East Asia and a multinational footprint.
Noel Quinn, the group's chief executive, said: “They are good businesses, but we lacked the scale to compete. “This next chapter of HSBC's presence in the US will see the team focus on our competitive strengths, connecting our global wholesale and wealth management clients to other markets around the world.”
Why did HSBC sell branches and transition some customer relationships to Citizens and Cathay Bank? In 2020, we set out a plan to shift our business strategy in the United States to maximize the connection between our clients and our world-class international network.
In November 2022 HSBC Group agreed to sell its banking operations in Canada (HSBC Canada) to the Royal Bank of Canada(RBC). This sale has been completed on the 28 March 2024. If you have an HSBC Canada account, we want to keep you informed of some of the changes that will result from the sale.
The HSBC scandal exposed a significant lapse in the bank's internal controls and corporate governance mechanisms. By allowing billions in illicit funds to move through its accounts, HSBC failed to uphold its corporate responsibility and ethical standards.
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