More evidence of Standard Chartered becoming the Bank of Bill came with its interim results. That’s Bill Winters, the hard-charging new chief executive who said the dividend was too high and so halved it.
New chief executives can do things like that in their honeymoon periods. The same goes for big customers, by which I mean Adani, the Indian group to which the bank is a big lender. The bank remains linked to Adani’s planned Australian coal mine which will send an appalling tonnage of coal ships through the waters of the Great Barrier Reef.
It’s a potential catastrophe that other banks have been ducking, most recently Commonwealth Bank of Australia, the country’s biggest lender.
Mr Winters’ outfit has only said its involvement is “suspended”. It should now take the hint and follow suit.
When you’re busy upsetting people it surely doesn’t hurt to generate a bit of positive PR.
