HSBC Blocks MPF Withdrawals For Those Leaving HK On BNO Visas To The UK!
- HK Wealth Management
- Feb 11, 2023
- 3 min read
IS YOUR MPF MONEY SAFE??!
Updated: 11 Feb 2023, 10:40 pm (HKT)
HSBC is once again in trouble with the government in the UK for withholding Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF) funds from those citizens that have left Hong Kong to the UK on BNO visas (British National Overseas).
Not surprisingly, HSBC has again come under attack from members of parliament in the UK over the way the London-headquartered, but essentially SAR-based bank, has withheld money from Hongkongers who have left the city on BNO visas.
The latest criticisms contained in a fresh damning report are not new to HSBC chief executive Noel Quinn.
After all, Quinn also faced many of the MPs at a parliamentary hearing in 2021 over similar concerns.
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He then stressed - famously or infamously, depending on how you look at it - that it was not for him to make a moral or political judgment on the matter.
The banking group will most likely deal with the latest condemnation as skilfully as ever, placing revenues and profits before morality and politics.
For HSBC, Hong Kong is like the goose that lays the golden eggs. The city is the group's biggest profit generator and, without considering morality and politics, it seems to make business sense to keep that gold-egg-laying goose.
One of the issues that HSBC has been taken to task about in the 23-page report prepared by an all-party group is the ban on Hongkongers from withdrawing their MPF savings if they move to live in the UK on BNO visas.
That is contrary to others who face no problem in getting the money if they leave Hong Kong for good on other settlement visas.
To be fair, it is legitimate for the MPs to say it is "unjust" to deny bank customers access to their MPF savings.
It is unjust in principle since MPF money is private property and owners should be able to withdraw it if they are leaving the city for good.
If others can, why can't those leaving on BNO visas?
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The denial has everything to do with exactly the type of politics Quinn had in mind in 2021.
Should HSBC be blamed for a fault that is not of its own making?
The situation in which the bank found itself trapped began after Huawei's then-chief financial officer Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Canada.
It intensified after Beijing clamped down on the pro-democracy movement in the SAR following the 2019 anti-government protests.
The dilemma facing HSBC is also a miniature reflection of the situation Hong Kong faces.
If given a realistic choice, perhaps Quinn might also wish to tell the MPs that it was not they - but he himself - who most wanted to return the MPF money to customers.
That's so he and his colleagues could be spared the summons to appear in parliament to sit like students in front of the MPs. Undoubtedly, Quinn would prefer to spend his time elsewhere.
As long as HSBC stands with one leg in London and another in Hong Kong, it has no choice but - ironically - to make a choice between them.
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Wasn't the choice already made the moment HSBC's then-Asia-Pacific head Vincent Wong Tung-shun signed a petition in support of the national security law despite a sea of controversy and after the SAR's former chief executive Leung Chun-ying criticized the group for not making its stance clear on the security law?
Credit: The Standard
10 Feb 2023.
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