(Dow Jones)--HSBC Holdings PLC (HBC) Thursday said it will exit its small retail operations in Poland, after saying in May that it was reviewing its retail activities in more than three dozen countries.
The bank said it will close down all retail and wealth management activities conducted through its 10 branches, and will instead focus on corporate and wholesale banking in the country. About 263 people work in the retail division.
The closure is expected to be one of the first of many since HSBC Chief Executive Stuart Gulliver in May said the bank will take stock of its retail banking in 39 countries as part of an aim to cut $2.5 billion to $3.5 billion from the annual cost base by 2013. HSBC in April said it would shut down retail banking in Russia, a country where the bank also determined that it didn't have sufficient scale.
"Following a strategic review it's clear that the strongest opportunity for HSBC in Poland lies in servicing corporate and institutional clients. That's why we're repositioning HSBC Poland to focus on better serving those clients with international needs," said Alan Jarman, CEO of HSBC Poland.
HSBC Holdings on Monday will report first-half results.
HSBC entered the Polish retail market in 2007 when the landscape was already dominated by Poland's home-grown banks, most of which were privatized and sold to large international institutions after 1989.
The market leader by assets is state-controlled PKO Bank Polski SA (PKO.WA), founded in 1919. It was the dominant retail bank in Poland during the communist era. It had more than 1,200 branches and 170 billion zlotys ($60.7 billion) in assets at the end of the first quarter.
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