May 28 (Bloomberg) -- Michael Geoghegan, HSBC Holdings Plc's chief executive officer, isn't sounding like all those heads of Wall Street firms who said the credit crunch is more than halfway done.

When Geoghegan addressed HSBC shareholders yesterday at a meeting in Hong Kong, where the company was founded in 1865, he said there may be more writedowns and losses on U.S. home loans beyond the $19.5 billion his company already has taken.

``We are not convinced yet the worst is over,'' he said during the informal gathering, a prelude to the London-based company's annual meeting in two days.

While Geoghegan was referring specifically to the U.S. mortgage market, his statement was a striking contrast to the optimism expressed by the CEOs of Citigroup Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co., Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and Morgan Stanley, all based in New York.

All five of them said in April that the debacle triggered by last year's collapse of the subprime-mortgage market -- and foreshadowed by HSBC's decision to increase loan-loan reserves in February 2007 -- had passed its midpoint.

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, less than two years removed from running Goldman, echoed that view. ``We are closer to the end of this problem than the beginning,'' he said during a Bloomberg Television interview on April 30.

Geoghegan's caution, in turn, followed UBS AG's acknowledgement that there may be more losses on mortgage securities after $38 billion in subprime-related writedowns.

`Could Increase'

UBS, Switzerland's biggest bank, said losses on real-estate- related investments outside the U.S. ``could increase in the future.'' The Zurich-based firm included this reference in the prospectus for a 16 billion-franc ($15.7 billion) rights offering now under way.

Then again, ``could'' was nowhere to be found in Geoghegan's statement. Nor was he talking about the world's mortgage markets -- something he must know a little about, as HSBC operates in 83 countries and territories by its own count.

Geoghegan isn't the only one concerned that the market for U.S. mortgages may worsen. Analysts at Bank of America Corp. and Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. reduced profit estimates on Goldman, Lehman and Morgan Stanley, whose second quarters end this week.

Projections for Lehman, the largest underwriter of mortgage bonds before the subprime disaster struck, took the biggest hit. Bank of America's Michael Hecht became the fourth analyst this month to foresee a loss, data compiled by Bloomberg show.

Falling Into Line?

Lehman's CEO, Richard Fuld, gave an upbeat view of the credit markets back in April. Fuld's assessment followed those of two of his Wall Street peers, Morgan Stanley's John Mack and Goldman's Lloyd Blankfein, and preceded those of JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon and Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit.

It's possible that Geoghegan might follow their lead when he speaks at HSBC's annual meeting. Even if he does, it's worth heeding his overriding caution and not assuming credit markets, and the firms that trade in them, will right themselves.

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MatlinPatterson Global Advisors LLC needed only about half an hour for its investment in Standard Pacific Corp., the past year's worst performer among homebuilders in Standard & Poor's benchmark U.S. stock indexes, to start paying off.

It took that long for Standard Pacific's stock to exceed the $3.05-a-share price that MatlinPatterson, a New York-based private-equity firm that focuses on financially distressed companies, will pay for most of a $530 million-plus investment.

Standard Pacific closed yesterday at $3.29, up 48 percent. Even so, the Irvine, California-based company's stock has fallen 85 percent during the past 12 months, the biggest drop among 15 companies in S&P's Supercomposite Homebuilding Index. None of the index's other components has lost more than 70 percent.

MatlinPatterson is also backing Thornburg Mortgage Co., another casualty of the U.S. housing industry's collapse. The Santa Fe, New Mexico-based home lender has fallen 41 percent to 75 cents since reaching an agreement with the firm on March 25. Shareholders will meet on June 12 to decide the plan's fate.

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Warner Music Group Corp.'s shareholders must be happy to see that Metallica, one of the company's top-selling acts, is promoting an album that won't come out for at least four months. The feeling may not last too long.

Metallica yesterday introduced a Web site with ``fly on the wall footage of writing and recording'' its ninth studio album, due in the U.S. fall season. The San Francisco-based band has sold about 100 million copies of its recordings since 1981.

The pending release will be the last under Metallica's contract with Warner, which has put out its albums since 1984. Chief Executive Officer Edgar Bronfman Jr. declined to comment on the status of talks with the band when the New York-based company held a quarterly conference call earlier this month.

Metallica's future at Warner may be short-lived. The band already sells recordings of its concerts over the Internet. The company lost Madonna to Live Nation Inc., which signed her last year. Other popular artists, such as Jay-Z, Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead, have also abandoned major labels in this decade.

(David Wilson is a Bloomberg News columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this column: David Wilson in New York at dwilson@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: May 28, 2008 00:01 EDT