Standard Chartered PLC shares are trading just shy of a fresh peak after a powerful 2025 rally, with investors weighing a familiar mix: capital returns, regulatory headlines, and the bank’s expanding bet on digitising cross‑border money movement.
As of the latest quoted data on 18 December 2025 (08:08 GMT), Standard Chartered stock was around 1,768.5p, up 0.31% on the day, with a market capitalisation near £39.9bn and a TTM P/E around 12.5. The stock set a new 52‑week high of 1,804.5p in Wednesday’s session (17 December) and is up roughly 77% over the last year. [1]
That “near-record” setup matters because the newsflow on 18 December 2025 is unusually on-theme for Standard Chartered: ongoing share buybacks on one side, and “future of money” infrastructure deals on the other—while regulators remain very much awake.
What’s driving Standard Chartered stock on 18 December 2025
1) Standard Chartered extends its buyback bid under the share price
In an RNS regulatory announcement dated 18 December 2025, Standard Chartered disclosed it repurchased 537,730 ordinary shares on 17 December 2025 via Goldman Sachs International under its existing buyback programme. The bank reported:
- Lowest price paid:1,765.0p
- Highest price paid:1,804.5p
- Volume‑weighted average price:1,784.63p
It also said it intends to cancel the repurchased shares and reported that, as of the prior day’s close (London time), it had applied an aggregate US$970.9m to share purchases under the programme—leaving investors with a clean, auditable breadcrumb trail for how aggressively the buyback is being executed into the year-end tape. [2]
Why the market cares: buybacks mechanically reduce share count over time and can support earnings per share (EPS), but they also function as a management “confidence signal”—especially when a stock is already near highs and the bank still chooses to retire equity rather than keep the capital idle.
2) Tokenised deposits with Ant International: “real money” meets blockchain plumbing
On Thursday, 18 December 2025, Standard Chartered announced the launch of blockchain‑based “tokenised deposits” in Singapore dollars and US dollars for Ant International, aiming to enable real‑time, 24/7 fund movement and treasury optimisation through Ant’s treasury platform, Whale. The project builds on learnings from the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s Project Guardian, and the rollout supports transactions not only in Singapore (SGD and USD) but also in Hong Kong (HKD, offshore CNH and USD). [3]
This matters for the equity story because Standard Chartered is positioning itself less like a purely rate-sensitive bank and more like a cross-border network + transaction banking + wealth platform where tech-enabled cash management and settlement rails can become recurring fee engines.
In plain English: it’s trying to make itself sticky in corporate treasuries—the place where switching costs and inertia are deliciously high.
3) A second digital-asset headline: Hana Securities and “digitally native notes”
Also dated 18 December 2025, Standard Chartered published a press release describing a transaction where Hana Securities gained exposure to a Digitally Native Note (DNN) via a Total Return Swap (TRS), with Standard Chartered acting as TRS provider. The DNN was described as being listed on the London Stock Exchange’s International Securities Market, with T+0 instant settlement via Euroclear’s Digital Financial Market Infrastructure (D‑FMI) using distributed ledger technology. [4]
Investors don’t need to become blockchain experts to understand the equity relevance: Standard Chartered is working to monetise the “pipes” of modern finance—settlement, custody-adjacent workflows, structured exposure, and regulated digital issuance—areas where the bank can plausibly defend margins even if global interest rates keep drifting lower.
The other headlines investors are pricing in this week
German regulator BaFin orders remediation and more capital at local unit
On 16 December 2025, Germany’s financial watchdog BaFin ordered Standard Chartered’s German unit to address organisational deficiencies and hold more capital, citing issues found in an audit including loan-granting processes and assessing risk-bearing capacity. Standard Chartered said it was taking the matter seriously and had already begun implementing corrective actions within the regulator’s timeframe. [5]
This is not the kind of headline that typically launches a stock to new highs. But investors often distinguish between:
- a contained subsidiary remediation issue, and
- a group-wide capital and conduct shock.
The key variable going forward is whether the required “more capital” is modest and local—or becomes a narrative about broader operational risk governance.
A UK shareholder litigation settlement adds context to “legacy risk”
The Financial Times reported last week that Standard Chartered agreed to settle a £1.5bn lawsuit brought by claimants representing investment funds tied to allegations around disclosures connected to past Iran sanctions compliance issues. The bank said the settlement was not material to its financial standing and denied liability. [6]
Even when “not material,” these events still matter for equity investors because they influence the market’s perception of governance, tail risk, and how much management bandwidth gets consumed by the past rather than deployed toward growth.
Sector tailwinds: bank stocks rally as rate-cut expectations firm
A separate, market-wide ingredient: UK banking shares have been strong amid shifting rate expectations. Reuters reported UK stocks rebounded on 17 December as banking stocks surged after a sharper-than-expected drop in inflation reinforced expectations for a Bank of England cut, lifting the broader banks index to its highest level since 2008—while Standard Chartered rose alongside peers. [7]
For Standard Chartered specifically—because it earns heavily outside the UK—sterling moves and global risk appetite can sometimes matter as much as UK policy rates.
Forecasts: what analysts (and the bank’s compiled consensus) expect for 2025–2027
Standard Chartered publishes a company-compiled consensus summary of sell-side estimates. In its “Post Q3’25 Consensus” (presented as of 3 December 2025, based on 16 analysts), the market is effectively pencilling in:
- FY2025 underlying operating income:$20.923bn
- FY2025 reported profit before tax:$7.163bn (vs $6.014bn FY2024)
- FY2025 profit attributable to ordinary shareholders:$4.692bn
- FY2025 reported EPS:202.3 cents
- FY2025 dividends per ordinary share:46.5 cents
Looking further out, the same consensus snapshot shows:
- FY2026 reported profit before tax:$7.216bn, and FY2027:$8.424bn
- FY2026 dividends per share:52.4 cents, and FY2027:62.3 cents
On profitability and capital, the consensus points to:
- Reported RoTE:12.3% (FY25) → 11.7% (FY26) → 13.6% (FY27)
- CET1 ratio: ~14.1% (FY25) → 13.9% (FY26) → 14.0% (FY27) [8]
Two details jump out for investors reading those tables carefully:
- Credit impairment is expected to rise. The consensus shows credit impairment moving from $557m (FY24) to $791m (FY25), then over $1bn in FY26–FY27. [9]
- Income mix is doing more of the work. Product-level consensus shows Wealth Solutions rising from $2.49bn (FY24) to $3.10bn (FY25) and $3.87bn (FY27), while Global Markets is expected to remain a very large contributor (about $4.01bn in FY25). [10]
That mix shift matters because Standard Chartered’s bull case is less “rates stay high forever” and more “fees, flow, and affluent clients compound.”
Management guidance: the bank is targeting ~13% RoTE in 2025, with 2026 guidance coming soon
In the Q3 2025 results transcript, Standard Chartered’s CFO said the bank was upgrading 2025 income growth guidance toward the upper end of its 5–7% range (constant currency, excluding notable items) and now expects a return on tangible equity of around 13% in 2025. The transcript also indicates the bank planned to present updated 2026 RoTE guidance at its full-year results in February. [11]
Reuters’ coverage of the Q3 results similarly emphasised that Standard Chartered said it would reach its 13% RoTE goal in 2025 rather than 2026, helped by strong wealth momentum. [12]
When is the next big catalyst? Full-year results on 24 February 2026
Standard Chartered’s investor events calendar lists the next key reporting date as:
- Q4’25 (full year) financial results: Tuesday, 24 February 2026 [13]
That’s the next “hard catalyst” where investors should expect:
- refreshed guidance (including the 2026 RoTE update flagged in the Q3 transcript),
- clarity on 2026 capital returns, and
- commentary on any regulatory remediation costs or capital impacts (including BaFin’s order at the German unit).
Valuation check: what the market is paying for the story right now
With STAN near 1,768.5p, the FT markets data shows:
- P/E (TTM): ~12.48
- Dividend yield: ~1.71%
- Shares outstanding: ~2.27bn
- Market cap: ~£39.92bn [14]
In a vacuum, a ~12x earnings multiple is not “meme-stock froth.” But context matters: the stock is also up strongly over the past year and is trading close to all-time highs for this cycle, which means expectations are less forgiving—especially if impairments rise faster than revenue, or if regulators force capital buffers higher than the market expects.
Key risks to watch in the Standard Chartered investment case
Here’s what can still bite (because finance is a haunted house with better suits):
- Regulatory and compliance drift: BaFin’s capital and governance demands could remain local—or could broaden into a narrative about operational risk controls. [15]
- Litigation and legacy issues: the reported £1.5bn settlement underscores that “old stories” can still generate new invoices. [16]
- Credit cycle turn: consensus expectations already imply higher credit impairment in 2026–27. If emerging-market stress rises, those numbers can move quickly. [17]
- Macro sensitivity (but not the simple UK-bank kind): Standard Chartered’s footprint makes it sensitive to global trade, FX moves, and risk appetite—not just UK rates. The recent UK bank rally shows how fast sentiment can swing on policy expectations. [18]
- Execution risk in digital assets/tokenisation: deals with Ant International and digitally native note structures can be strategically smart, but they also sit in a fast-moving regulatory landscape where compliance, controls, and reputation matter as much as innovation. [19]
Bottom line on Standard Chartered PLC stock on 18 December 2025
Standard Chartered’s share price strength into 18 December looks anchored in three reinforcing forces:
- Capital returns are active and visible (regular buyback disclosures with meaningful scale). [20]
- The bank is leaning into “next-gen finance plumbing”—tokenised deposits with Ant and digitally native note exposure via swaps—while staying in regulated, institution-friendly lanes rather than crypto casino vibes. [21]
- Analysts expect continued profit growth and rising dividends through 2027, even as they model higher credit impairment and keep CET1 broadly stable around ~14%. [22]
The next moment when the narrative can meaningfully reprice—up or down—is the full-year results on 24 February 2026, when updated 2026 guidance and capital return framing should hit the market at the same time. [23]
References
1. markets.ft.com, 2. www.tradingview.com, 3. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 4. www.sc.com, 5. www.reuters.com, 6. www.ft.com, 7. www.reuters.com, 8. www.sc.com, 9. www.sc.com, 10. www.sc.com, 11. www.sc.com, 12. www.reuters.com, 13. www.sc.com, 14. markets.ft.com, 15. www.reuters.com, 16. www.ft.com, 17. www.sc.com, 18. www.reuters.com, 19. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 20. www.tradingview.com, 21. www.businesstimes.com.sg, 22. www.sc.com, 23. www.sc.com
