Sorry for continuing on Handelsbanken (SHB) in the this Nordea thread (and yes SHB should have its own thread).
When I first started investing in Handelsbanken in 2015 it was in my view the best bank by all parameters (I still own SHB). Today not so anymore.
If I had to pick the best bank overall today it would be (I) Nordea, followed by (II) SEB and SHB comes third. SHB is probably still the best of mitigating risk but SHB has some internal challenges.
These are mainly originating from a very conservative internal culture. Hence why the current Nordea CEO was fired from his position of CEO of SHB. He suggested a mayor transformation of reducing the number of SHB bank branches in Sweden. SHB was not ready for that then and he was let go.
What happened a number of years later? They did exactly that.
Nordea was lucky in that perspective as they now have what I view the best bank CEO of the Nordic banks. He is clear when he communicates and has taken some elements from SHB into Nordea, namely (and above all) a cost culture.
This brings me into SHB current problem. It is not the banking business. Its their messy communication. When the new CEO Michael Green arrived his mantra and narrative was that cost must be reduced and there was internal inefficiencies.
There was big headlines in Dagens Industri of his first day that he had stopped the installation of an expensive marble floor that was to be installed at the HQ. And there were talks of reducing personnel at the HQ as it had become too big and people were not focused on contributing in a meaningful way.
Fast forward today. What happens? Expenses are out of control. No clear and detailed information of why exactly there are almost 1000 more persons on the pay roll (compared to a year ago), just some info of general IT stuff and security etc.
My point: they must had known already in Q4 that costs are going to increase significantly and why not let the market know by then. Also, I get increasingly frustrated by listening to SHB conf call. Its in Swedish with interpretation to English 
Who does not report in English today, especially if you are a bigger bank? It is a symbol of the conservative culture in SHB. 
My final words: even if SHB lags in terms of valuation (book value around 1 and probably now below) to the rest of its Nordic peers it does not deserve similair valuation such as Nordea or SEB for that matter.
– Rant over –
An annoyed SHB shareholder
tavoitehinnoista 