Standard Chartered resuming split teams in HK on virus threat

Bloomberg

Standard Chartered Plc will start working in split teams again in Hong Kong as the spread of the omicron variant threatens a fifth wave of infections in the Asian financial hub.
In a memo to staff, the bank said it will resume a “hard-split A/B team arrangement” for “critical functions” to ensure business continuity. It urged employees to bring laptops home every day and called on staff to avoid large-scale organised events and unnecessary social gatherings. A spokeswoman confirmed the contents of the memo.
“We’ve managed through multiple Covid-19 waves before so we know we can overcome this,” the bank said in the memo. The reemergence of protective measures comes about seven months since business life largely return to normal as the city’s fourth wave of infections subsided.
Hong Kong has detected the first preliminary positive case of Covid-19 from an unknown source in almost three months. City official also ordered gyms, swimming pools, closed for two weeks and restaurants to end dine-in services at 6 pm.

Standard Chartered fined $61Mn After Spreadsheet Error

Standard Chartered Plc has been handed a record fine by the UK’s top banking regulator after a spreadsheet error resulted in the emerging markets-focused lender overestimating its access to US dollar funding.
The Bank of England’s Prudential Regulatory Authority imposed a 46.6 million pound ($61 million) penalty on the lender for five reporting errors between March 2018 and May 2019, according to a statement. That was compounded in one case by Standard Chartered only notifying the PRA of a miscalculation after a four-month internal investigation.
Standard Chartered’s struggles with reporting its dollar funding were not helped by the departure of two staff from
its specialist liquidity team in mid-2018, the Prudential Regulatory Authority said.