Who is Pam Kaur, HSBC’s first woman CFO in lender’s 160-year history

HSBC made history as it named Indian-origin Pam Kaur as its chief financial officer. Kaur is the first woman to occupy that role in the bank’s 160-year old history. Kaur, an MBA from India’s Panjab University, joins a growing list of women in top global banking roles. 

Kaur, upon her appointment, joins the ranks of Citi CEO Jane Fraser, Morgan Stanley CFO Sharon Yeshaya, JP Morgan’s Mary Erdoes, Marianne Lake and Jennifer Piepszak.

WHO IS PAM KAUR?

Pam Kaur, 60, joined HSBC from Deutsche Bank in April 2013. She rose to the role of group chief risk and compliance officer before she was promoted to CFO. Prior to HSBC, Kaur held senior risk and audit positions at Citi and Lloyds Banking Group. She also worked for Royal Bank of Scotland. 

In her LinkedIn profile, Kaur describes herself as a "passionate supporter of diversity and inclusion" and a global sponsor of HSBC's Embrace employee network which helps attract, retain and engage a more diverse ethnic and multicultural workforce among the lender's 225,000 staff worldwide.

Kaur is expected to bring her extensive experience to forge HSBC’s future direction, as well as assist newly-appointed CEO Elhdedery to steer client-facing activities. Elhedery said Tuesday's reorganisation would help unleash the lender's full potential.

The newly-appointed CFO is expected to take on the immediate challenges, as well as push for the bank’s efforts to narrow its gender pay gap. 

HSBC shares have underperformed peers so far this year, rising 7% versus the European index's 20% gain despite multi-billion dollar share buyback programmes and consistent dividend growth.