00:00HSBC has appointed Brendan Nelson as its new chair or its next chair, replacing financier Mark Tucker, who has led Europe's largest lender for much of the last decade.
00:10He takes the reins as CEO George L. Hedery pushes through a massive overhaul of HSBC that's seen the bank reorganized into four new divisions.
00:18Let's get some perspective on what this means. Our managing editor for EMEA Finance, Tom Metcalf, joins us on set right now.
00:26So what does this mean? Good morning, Tom. What does this mean that they've chosen this person to lead the business from the chairmanship perspective?
00:33Yeah, I think it's very much a safe pair of hands. It's kind of a reversion to what they traditionally did prior to Mark Tucker, which is look internally.
00:42You know, I think safe pair of hands is a great way of explaining it. They went out. They looked at external candidates.
00:47There's a few things here. A, just a sense that none of those external candidates had, you know, perhaps everything they were looking for.
00:53A, and B, you know, for such a big behemoth as HSBC, it probably makes a lot of sense to look internally, somebody who can immediately jump on.
01:01And perhaps it reflects that dynamic of, you know, you've got George L. Hedery as this very high profile dynamic CEO.
01:07And perhaps now the sort of dynamic they're looking for between the chairman and CEO is the chairman who, you know,
01:13perhaps takes a bit more of a low profile back seat compared to a Mark Tucker who was famously hands-on.
01:19Is he an interim permanent chairman?
01:22I like that. Well, exactly. He's the interim chairman. He's become the permanent chairman.
01:25But, yeah, the big question is how long for, right? He's 75, 76.
01:29And I think yesterday, actually, Al Hedery said something along those lines that, you know,
01:33he certainly wouldn't be looking, Brendan Nelson, this is, to sort of be in the seat for as long as Mark Tucker.
01:38He was there for eight, nine years.
01:40So the search continues?
01:40Is this a sign that they haven't found the right person, basically?
01:44They had this search. They couldn't find the right person.
01:46They've got an interim. They need somebody in the chair.
01:48Let's make it permanent, but we'll carry on looking.
01:50Is that how I should read this?
01:52Yeah, I certainly think kind of in the medium term, you know, so, you know, probably give a year,
01:56maybe two for sort of Al Hedery to make his mark.
01:59They'll see where, you know, geopolitics are going.
02:01They'll see where the bank is going.
02:02And then, yes, naturally, you would think it's a great time for the board,
02:05perhaps with a little bit more time than they had in this process,
02:08to really do an extensive search, perhaps without that pressure of who is it going to be?
02:12Mark Tucker's left the building.
02:14You know, where is the permanent replacement?
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