, Columnist
HSBC Chair Is One of The Toughest Jobs — Fancy It?
Georges Elhedery, chief executive officer of HSBC Holdings Pl c
Photographer: Bloomberg/BloombergHSBC Holdings Plc’s hunt for a new chair is over – for a few years, at least. The bank, based in London and Hong Kong, found its candidate on its own board: Brendan Nelson, an independent director since 2023 and former senior partner at KPMG LLP. Nelson will be upgraded from interim to stopgap chairman. At 76 years old, he doesn’t want to serve a full six-year term.
The appointment underlines the difficulty of filling these roles at major global banks in general and more so at HSBC. Neither of the reported final two external candidates quite cut it. Now the bank at least has a longer, less-pressured spell to find a longer-term solution. That won’t make the search any easier.