( Financial Times ) -- HSBC is gearing up for thousands more job cuts , with Europe 's biggest bank by market value set to outline the next stage in its strategic overhaul at an investor day in two months ' time . `` There is no fantastical new strategy out there , '' said one person familiar with the bank 's planning . `` But there 's still huge potential to be more efficient . '' Stuart Gulliver , HSBC 's chief executive , said when he announced annual results last week that he would `` fixate on costs '' over the coming year and promised to find a further $ 1bn of annual savings in 2013 . The job cuts target has still to be fixed but people close to the bank suggested up to 5,000 staff could go as part of the $ 1bn savings plan . If HSBC maintained the recent rate of staff cuts to cost savings , the number would be closer to 10,000 . Mr Gulliver , in charge since early 2011 , has spent the past two years trying to streamline HSBC 's global network of fiefdoms , both in order to impose more control from head office in London and to strip out overlaps and inefficiencies . HSBC has already exceeded its target of finding $ 2.5- $ 3.5bn of cost savings by 2013 , announcing $ 3.6bn of `` sustainable annual savings '' with its 2012 results . But the bank remains as far as ever from a related target -- to cut the bank 's elevated cost-income ratio to between 48 and 52 per cent . Last year the ratio , which measures overheads as a proportion of revenue , spiralled upwards to 62.8 per cent . The number was inflated by the one-off cost of paying a $ 1.9bn fine to US regulators over money laundering and sanctions abuses . But even with that stripped out the cost-income ratio was still 56 per cent , as revenue numbers were held back by anaemic economic growth in much of the world . The details of Mr Gulliver 's plan are set to be outlined to investors in May . The bank is expected to close or sell a further eight to 10 businesses this year and next , in addition to the 49 already divested since 2011 . The new job cuts will come in addition to a sharp reduction of staff numbers -- from 302,000 to 260,000 -- over the past two years . About 10,000 of the headcount reduction so far has been the result of divestments , with the rest due to cuts . But according to people involved in planning the investor day , the tally of cuts could be more dramatic still if Mr Gulliver presses ahead with plans to uproot HSBC 's tradition of in-house software development . The number of staff working in that area is already estimated to have been trimmed from 27,000 to about 21,000 . But many more are likely to go as the bank shifts towards an outsourcing approach . Bankers said contraction was likely to be gradual and would be offset to an extent by the creation of new jobs as HSBC pushes aggressively into new technology areas , such as mobile banking . © The Financial Times Limited 2013 .
HSBC is gearing up for thousands more job cuts . Comment: