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Standard Chartered Bank
BusinessBanking & Finance

Standard Chartered may restart ‘shareholder returns’ next year as third-quarter profit beats estimates

  • Emerging markets lender will evaluate reinstating shareholder returns, such as dividends, in early 2021
  • Underlying pre-tax profit was US$745 million, well above a consensus estimate of US$502 million

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Standard Chartered CEO Bill Winters, like many of his banking rivals, is considering whether to restart the bank’s dividend payments. Photo: Xiaomei Chen
Chad Bray

Standard Chartered, one of Hong Kong’s three big currency-issuing banks, said on Thursday it could begin returning capital to shareholders, including potential dividends, next year as it reported better-than-expected profit in the third quarter.

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Following similar guidance by its larger Hong Kong rival HSBC this week, Standard Chartered said it was encouraged by the lender’s recent performance and would consider resuming “shareholder returns” after it reports its full-year results in February.

“I feel good about where Standard Chartered is six months into a global crisis. We’re profitable. We’ve got a strong capital position and are getting stronger,” Bill Winters, the Standard Chartered chief executive, said on a conference call with analysts. “Banking advances are made or not during the difficult times. I feel we are coming into this difficult time, have come into it and are going through it in very good shape.”

Any decision on dividends or share buy-backs would be subject to discussions with its regulators, the bank said. In April, Standard Chartered and HSBC both cancelled their final dividends for 2019, suspended dividend payments this year and tabled share buy-backs at the request of their chief regulator in the United Kingdom.

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Restarting dividends and share buy-backs have been a key focus for many lenders globally as they face pressure on their stock prices, despite stronger-than-expected performances in the third quarter and the International Monetary Fund’s prediction of a “somewhat less severe” global downturn sparked by the coronavirus pandemic.
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