HSBC has moved higher after selling its stake in China's Ping An Insurance for $9.4bn, as part of its move to dispose of unwanted assets.
The buyer is a conglomerate controlled by Thailand's richest man, Dhanin Chearavanont, and gives HSBC a hefty profit on the deal. Its shares have climbed 6.6p to 642.8p, and analyst Ian Gordon at Investec said:
HSBC has now agreed terms for the disposal of its entire 15.6% stake in Ping An for $9.4bn, triggering a $2.6bn post-tax gain, raising its 30 September 2012 proforma core tier 1 ratio to an eye-popping 12.2%. Given constrained near-term capital redeployment options, we see a small (2 cent) upside potential for the 2012 dividend versus consensus expectations of 43 cents. In contrast to HSBC's 19% holding in BoCom, we have always regarded its stake in Ping An as a non-strategic play on China – one which has turned out rather well.
