Household HSBC Watch

This time state attorney’s general are asking HSBC Finance for something other than evidence of predatory lending. They are asking for help. What will be the result if requests are ignored? History shows that HSBC Finance was Household International, which was purchased by HSBC in 2003. Prior to that Household was […]

It has been ten years since consumer advocates started Household - HSBC Watch. Sometimes we wonder where the years went. Ten years ago we started a single web page on a free server. Now we have over 3000 visitors every day. Part of the traffic obviously is a result of the […]

HSBC Holdings PLC isn’t interested in buying Morgan Stanley, a person familiar with the bank said Friday. “HSBC has made clear in the past that buying an investment bank is not on its agenda,” the person added. “HSBC feels Morgan Stanley is not worth pursuing.” It appears as though HSBC is not interested […]

According to the Star Telegram, three credit cards to avoid are First Premier Bank (the card’s first-year fees add up to $276), HSBC American DreamCard (which has a steep 15 percent to 22 percent APR) and New Millennium Visa or MasterCard (which has no grace period to repay purchases or cash advances before a finance […]

Kudos to The Guardian for this article. As bad as finances are in the U.K. we found out that executive perks at HSBC remain untouched. The TUC PensionWatch report identifies a senior HSBC finance director who ‘receives an executive allowance of 55 per cent of annual basic salary to fund personal pension arrangements’. […]

Bankruptcy laws were changed and strengthened in 2005. Then greedy banksters, mortgage brokers, and lending companies felt safe. They could do whatever they wanted to do, since it was harder to declare bankruptcy. Nationally, the total number of bankruptcies filed in the first half of 2008, however, rose 29.2 percent, to 522,205, […]

In the US Banker section of American Banker, we spotted an interesting line: “The concern was, ‘How much subprime do you do? What is your risk of having what Household (International) had?’” It was a question asked of Richard Davis, CEO of U.S. Bancorp, in February 2007. HSBC bought Household in […]

This is a perfect example of HSBC’s exportation of the Household International model of doing business. Credit card interest rates have been increased to as high as 50 percent in India. While proud of making a profit in developing nations HSBC is not alone. ICIC, Deutsche Bank, SBI and HSBC have either […]

Not too long ago a finance company like CitiFinancial, Beneficial Finance, or HFC could loan to people with less than perfect credit. Some loans would make money. Then greedy bankers and predatory brokers exploded the practice, and subprime was born. It changed the dictionary. Therefore it is proper to say that […]

Earlier today we reported on stronger rules in the GCC. Now it is India taking new initiatives. Proposals by Indian regulators in October to curb offshore investment vehicles used by hedge funds triggered a panic among investors that halted trading on Mumbai exchanges for an hour and wiped out $100 billion of value […]