Tucker wields a red card

JOHN Flint’s premature departure as chief executive of HSBC has sparked fevered speculation. Among the theories is that Flint found himself on the wrong side (as far as Beijing is concerned) of the US dispute with China over the alleged nefarious behaviour of telecoms group Huawei.

Maybe. But previous boss Stuart Gulliver suffered much worse and stayed. this included disclosure of a salary paid through Panama, revelations of tax avoidance at the bank’s Geneva branch and expensive settlements over historic money laundering and the sale of mortgage securities.

Doubtless Huawei didn’t help his survival chances but the broader truth is that Flint was, in soccer terms, a squad player who, when asked to wear the three lions of England, just couldn’t make a decent pass.

Almost every part of the enterprise is seen by the HSBC board as having performed below par and chairman and Chelsea enthusiast Mark tucker decided to act like Roman Abramovich.

He rid the bank of a sub-optimal manager quickly rather than allow him to drag the team down.

tucker must take some responsibility for the failed Flint succession. He was presented with a shortlist of candidates soon after he was parachuted in from Hong King-based AIA to be the first outside chairman of HSBC. Given the bank’s long tradition of appointing internally, he chose Flint even though some who had encountered the now departing boss found him unimpressive.

Colleagues who worked with Flint put this down to painful shyness. But that is not perhaps the best characteristic in a world of big ‘swinging dicks’, as author Michael Lewis colourfully described bankers.

normally, it is the job of a new chairman to sack the chief executive. In HSBC’s case, tucker both appointed him and sacked him. that is a rare double in an 18-month period when the shares slipped 15pc. Incidentally, Flint’s stint as chief executive was positively lengthy when compared to that of Michael o’neill, who resigned on the day that he started the job as Barclays boss in 1999 because of an alleged heart condition. It turned out to be a bad bout of flu and o’neill regretted the decision.

there will be much speculation as to who will succeed Flint. tucker is likely to be cautious about an internal choice on the principle of once bitten, twice shy.

nevertheless, he is thought to have a great deal of time for noel Quinn, chief executive of HSBC’s commercial banking division, who has been chosen as interim boss. Quinn is said to have been handed the ball and is facing an open goal.

Speculation is certain to be rife about an outside successor with Lloyds Banking Group’s turnaround expert Antonio Horta osorio likely to be in the frame. His lack of Asian experience (except in Singapore) and a reputation as something of a peacock could be seen as out of keeping with HSBC’s hosed down culture.

Clean skins

THERE is a tradition of poachers turned gamekeepers in finance. Famously the short-seller, Joseph P Kennedy, was chosen by Franklin Roosevelt to be the first head of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

the current governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney, (as well as assorted financial policymakers around the world) are veterans of Goldman Sachs, fined for its role in the financial crisis.

Indeed, anyone involved in banking in the run up to the 2008 meltdown is likely to have baggage.

As a former trader at malfunctioning Deutsche Bank, it is not that surprising, as Euromoney has reported, that Chancellor Sajid Javid was involved in the collateralised debt obligations at the core of the financial crisis. there is scarcely a banker of his generation who was not tainted in some way.

what Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell has forgotten is that it was Labour that was responsible for the calamitous lack of enforcement which resulted in the biggest financial catastrophe for a century.

Ill Wills

AFTER the House of Fraser fiasco and disclosure of a tax dispute with Belgium, Mike Ashley might deserve a breather.

not a bit of it. the Sports Direct boss cannot resist the sight of a retailer going begging and has snapped up out-of-favour university chic brand Jack wills from administrators KPMG.

Sports Direct’s cash reserves of almost £500m mean that the buyer of last resort is not done yet.