Standard Chartered posts worst losses since 1998; shares tumble

The bank says it expects the financial performance to remain subdued during 2016 given current market conditions.

Standard Chartered shares plunged after the bank said its pretax loss for the full-year 2015 was $1.5 billion, which was a stark fall from a $4.2 billion profit a year ago.

The losses came mainly from the restructuring charges of $1.8 billion and reflected the bank's worst result since 1998.

The stock dropped as much as 12 percent after the earnings showed underlying pretax profit was $800 million, hit by weak commodity prices and low interest rates in a volatile market. The underlying profits a year earlier were $5.2 billion.

The Asia-focused bank's shares have fallen 22 percent so far this year. The bank announced last year it was cutting 15,000 jobs to help save $2.9 billion by 2018.

The bank said in a statement it expects the financial performance to remain subdued during 2016 given current market conditions.

"While our 2015 financial results were poor, they are set against a backdrop of continuing geo-political and economic headwinds and volatility across many of our markets. We expect the financial performance of the group to remain subdued during 2016," Chief Executive Officer Bill Winters said in a statement.

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