HSBC pushes into Australian SME market
HSBC Bank Australia has announced a major push into Australia’s business banking market with a transactional banking offering and international products and services targeting Australia’s internationally oriented small to medium enterprises (SMEs).
HSBC Business products and services will be rolled out from August 2010 and include foreign exchange, trade finance and payments and cash management, with the international products tailored to Australian businesses.
HSBC Bank Australia chief executive Paulo Maia said the strategy represented a major push by HSBC into the Australian SME banking market.
HSBC said it would use the group’s global scale to drive efficiencies through common propositions and systems.
Noel McNamara, head of commercial banking for HSBC Australia, said HSBC Business would compete with local banks for the business of SMEs with international businesses or cross-border needs.
“Around 14 per cent of Australian SMEs are exporting and this will only increase as global trade continues to grow. Around 19 per cent of Australian SME exporters are exporting to ASEAN countries and 14 per cent of them are trading with China,” he said.
The new offering would also deepen the HSBC’s relationships with its personal banking customers, he said.
“Our international and mass affluent HSBC Premier customer base is growing at a rate of more than 50 per cent per year. One in five new-to-bank HSBC Premier customers run their own business and one in three of them already bank with HSBC in more than one country,” McNamara said.
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