HSBC Holdings Plc will incur $1.8 billion in charges over the next two years as it embarks on a global restructuring program that has seen the lender shutter some of its businesses and slash management ranks.

Europe’s largest bank, which has been deepening its push into Asia and some Middle East markets, said it hopes the restructuring will allow it to whittle away $3 billion in expenses in the coming years. About half of that would then be reinvested into priority growth areas, according to its full-year earnings presentation Wednesday.

“Since becoming CEO, I have focused on simplifying how we operate,” Chief Executive Officer Georges Elhedery said in a statement in which he also detailed a $2 billion share buyback. “We are creating a simple, more agile, focused bank built on our core strengths.”

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The lender’s shares, which have surged 15.4 percent so far this year, were up 0.2 percent in early afternoon Hong Kong trading. Analysts at Jefferies Financial Group Inc said “some investors would have hoped for a better than $2 billion share buyback”.

With Elhedery at the helm for roughly six months, HSBC has witnessed one of the biggest upheavals in more than a decade. He wound down some of the lender’s investment banking operations in Europe, the UK and Americas in a bid to focus on areas where it could “best serve” its corporate and institutional clients.

The broad moves have also seen a slew of top executives heading for the exit. The bank said Wednesday that its “severance and other up-front costs” will be spread through this year and next. The lender is focused on “opportunities where we have a clear competitive advantage,” the lender said.

Refocused bank

Last month, HSBC announced it would no longer provide equity underwriting and advisory services outside of its core operations in Asia and the Middle East. Those selective investment banking businesses have annual costs of approximately $300 million and are not “materially profitable”, according to HSBC presentation slides.

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The company also noted its made progress on efforts to exit German private banking and French life insurance.

“Costs taken from non-strategic activities will be invested in priority growth areas,” HSBC said in the presentation. The bank forecast that its full-year expenses are expected to rise about 3 percent in 2025.

Bloomberg News reported in December that HSBC was examining plans to cut costs by at least $3 billion. Discussions over the scale of the cuts have been going on for months at the top level.

Days after taking over from Noel Quinn as CEO, Elhedery told a town-hall meeting in Hong Kong that he would be focused on keeping a lid on costs. Six weeks later, he unveiled the revamp that also involved creating a new global commercial and institutional banking unit through the combination of two of the lender’s largest divisions, while splitting Hong Kong and the UK as standalone businesses.

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Further management changes have followed, including the December announcement of the departure of Annabel Spring, global head of private banking. Other senior managers have been forced to reapply for their jobs. “The process has been measured, thoughtful and fair,” Elhedery said at the time.

The CEO has also set in motion plans for further asset sales and business closures, including a strategic review of the bank’s Maltese operations, sale of its South Africa corporate banking unit, as well as the closing of HSBC’s Zing payments app. Last month, the bank said it would stop providing M&A and equity underwriting services in New York, London, and continental Europe.

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In other parts of the business, HSBC also disclosed its exposure to the Chinese mainland commercial real estate at $7.3 billion, which has been falling compared to the second quarter of last year.