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HSBC Quarterly Profit Climbs, Plans $1 Billion Buyback

Published on Tue, 27.Oct.2026

Topic of the day

HSBC Holdings reported higher third-quarter net profit and announced a new share buyback of up to $1 billion. The London-based bank said Tuesday that net profit rose 45% from a year earlier to $7.09 billion for the three months ended Sept. 30. That still missed the estimate of $7.24 billion in a poll of analysts by data provider Visible Alpha. The bank said quarterly results were supported by growth in banking net interest income and lower expected credit losses. The year-earlier bottom line was weighed by a $1.1 billion provision for a lawsuit tied to Bernie Madoff’s multibillion-dollar Ponzi scheme. Third-quarter pretax profit rose for its Hong Kong business, its U.K. business and its corporate and institutional banking business, while that of its international wealth and premier banking business fell. HSBC said it will start a share buyback of up to $1 billion, which it expects to complete by the time it announces 2026 results. Under Chief Executive Georges Elhedery, HSBC has been undergoing a broad strategic overhaul, cutting costs and streamlining operations.

Swiss stocks

Save for a very brief while at the start, the Swiss market's benchmark index SMI stayed positive throughout the session on Monday thanks to easing inflation concerns and optimism about corporate earnings. The SMI ended the day with a gain of 76.59 points or 0.53% at 14,538.95, slightly off the day's high of 14,543.91. ABB climbed 2.8%, while Kuehne + Nagel, VAT Group and Sandoz Group gained 2.5%, 2.4% and 2.1%, respectively. Julius Baer, Roche, Schindler Ps, Richemont, Helvetia Baloise Holding, Geberit, Swiss Life Holding, UBS Group, Partners Group and Lonza Group gained 0.5%-1.7%. Sika ended down 2.22%. Givaudan and Straumann Holding lost 1.33% and 1.1%, respectively. Lindt & Spruengli ended nearly 1% down. Novartis, Swisscom and Swiss Re closed modestly lower.

International markets

Europe
European stocks closed higher on Monday as easing concerns about inflation due to a drop in oil prices helped underpin sentiment. Hopes that diplomatic efforts will help ease tensions in West Asia contributed as well to the positive mood in the markets. Meanwhile, investors looked ahead to central bank meetings this week. The Federal Reserve, the European Central Bank and the Bank of Japan are scheduled to make their monetary policy announcements. The pan European Stoxx 600 climbed 0.77%. The UK's FTSE 100 gained 0.72%, Germany's DAX and France's CAC ended higher by 0.91% and 0.83%, respectively. Among other markets in Europe, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland, Norway, Poland, Russia, Spain, Sweden and Türkiye closed higher. Netherlands edged up marginally. Iceland and Portugal ended weak, while Austria and Belgium closed flat. In the UK market, Computacenter soared more than 11%. The technology and services provider has lifted its full-year guidance after reporting stronger-than-expected third-quarter results. The company said that it now expects FY26 adjusted pre-tax profits of no less than £425 million, compared with current analyst consensus of £387.1 million. Babcock International surged 6.6% and Rolls-Royce Holdings climbed 5.7%. IAG, Antofagasta, Intercontinental Hotels Group, BAE Systems, Diploma, JD Sports Fashion, Melrose Industries, Standard Chartered, Barclays, Weir, Ithaca Energy, IMI, Kingfisher, Burberry Group, Polar Capital Holdings gained 2.5%-4%. Smiths Group, Natwest Group, Fresnillo, Anglo American Plc, British American Tobacco, Metlen Energy & Metals, 3i, Next, St. James's Place and Lloyds Banking Group also moved up sharply. Experian shed more than 6%. Auto Trader Group, The Sage Group, Relx, SSE, Smith & Nephew, BP and LSEG lost 1%-2.5%.

United States
U.S. stocks rose as Anthropic's initial-public offering filing stemmed anxiety about a potential artificial-intelligence bubble ahead of tech earnings reports and a Federal Reserve policy statement later in the week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 146.42 points, or 0.28%, to 52361.58. The broad S&P 500 gained 53.09 points, or 0.70%, to 7676.77, and the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite added 214.04 points, or 0.82%, to 26169.38. The tech sector recovered some of its recent losses after AI giant Anthropic filed an S-1 IPO registration form with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The maker of AI models and agents intends to go public the week of Nov. 16 and may raise $100 billion or more in an IPO that would value the company at $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion. Meta Platforms unveiled a plan to raise up to $95 billion in waves of stock offerings, as the Facebook owner continues its big spending on artificial-intelligence infrastructure. Shares of Meta fell 1.9% to $630.56 as investors remained nervous about Mark Zuckerberg's aggressive capital expenditure plans. One brokerage said the four largest hyperscalers account for roughly 75% of planned AI capital expenditures. It was another volatile session as SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk predicted consolidation and failures among the "neocloud" companies like CoreWeave, comparing them to vulnerable "guppy" fish. CoreWeave's shares closed the market session up 1.8% at $55.19 but are still down 35% this month. Rival Nebius, another heavily indebted cloud-computing firm, declined 3.4% to $153.27. DoorDash is in advanced talks to acquire food-delivery rival Instacart in a deal that might be completed as soon as this week, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Asia
Asian shares showed a mixed performance on Tuesday. Investors were weighing up the eagerly awaited IPO of AI pioneer Anthropic ahead of this week’s US Federal Reserve interest rate meeting.

Bonds
U.S. treasury yields were mixed, with short-term rates rising ahead of the Federal Reserve's policy meeting, which begins Tuesday. The yield on the policy-sensitive two-year Treasury rose 0.032 percentage point to 4.712%. The yield on the 10-year Treasury note ticked up 0.0001 percentage point to 4.987%. The yield on the 30-year bond declined 0.014 percentage point to 5.300%.

Analysis
UBS raises Kühne + Nagel to 230 (225) CHF – Neutral
UBS raises Relx to 3,780 (3,600) GBp – Buy
UBS raises Eni to 32 (30) EUR – Buy


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