HSBC laid off staff within its London-based global marketing department on Wednesday, including the marketer leading the division.
Among those out is Amanda Rendle, the bank's global head of marketing for commercial banking, global banking, and markets, a source told Business Insider. She had been with HSBC for 15 years.
Around half a dozen staff within the marketing department have been laid off in London and there's the potential that more roles will be cut in the various teams within the group marketing division's global offices as HSBC looks to cut costs, our source said.
HSBC's chief marketing officer Chris Clark is not affected by the changes.
HSBC told Business Insider it does not comment on the status of its employees.
The global marketing department had only recently restructured to create a "strong global function" alongside its local teams in six markets, Rendle told Campaign Magazine back in September.
In June, HSBC said it would eliminate up to 50,000 jobs as part of plans to refocus on Asia and save up to $5 billion in annual costs by 2017. Banks are also often known to lay off staff at the year-end anyway in a bid to cut costs and breathe new life into their organizations the following year.
The bank has faced a number of perception challenges in recent months, including being hit with separate multi-million dollar fines over money laundering in its Swiss banking arm, mis-selling its consumer banking products, and for Libor rate-fixing.
Rendle told Marketing Magazine in July that through marketing, HSBC was looking to take the brand back to its 150-year-old roots: "I think from the banking crisis a lot of banking brands have had to go back and look at their purpose and look at what they are there for. They have to go back to customers and say ‘this is what we are here for and we’re going to re-orchestrate the business to be for the customer.'"
Here's HSBC's most recent TV ad released last month, created by London-based ad agency JWT, which is responsible for the bank's brand advertising activity:
Last month HSBC announced its third quarter results, which saw it report a 32% pre-tax profit hike, partly because it is getting fined less. However, its revenues were hit by a slowdown in Chinese economic growth.
HSBC has been warning the market for the last six months that it is on the cusp of relocating its London headquarters, due to constantly changing regulations in the City — a move backed by some of its most prominent shareholders and one that will no likely see more disruption within the marketing division.
