HSBC Holdings is working hard to give away $55 million worth of its own shares, but is finding it uphill work.
Exactly two years ago tomorrow the company started mailing new certificates to shareholders after the formation of a new holding company for the group to replace Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation.
But some shareholders appeared to have vanished.
''I think that most of them were probably people who have moved overseas and never left a forwarding address,'' said Mr Bob Sherbin, a spokesman for the bank. ''Some of these people may also be deceased.'' Last week, the company had 805,068 shares from 1,573 shareholdings lodged in an account in Jersey, plus two years of accumulated dividends, and for anyone thinking that some of the shares might be theirs, there is a chilling warning: you have only 18 years left to claim them.
For 10 years after April 1991, the bank is required by statute to advertise every six months for shareholders to come forward with some proof that they own the shares, and identification.
A legal notice was placed in this newspaper and others late last week.