| Type | Public |
|---|---|
| Industry | Finance and Banking |
| Founded | 1990 |
| Headquarters | Stockholm, Sweden |
| Key people | Mats Qviberg, Founder and Chairman Sven Hagströmer, Founder Patrik Enblad, CEO |
| Products | mutual funds |
| Employees | 200 |
| Website | www.hq.se |
HQ AB is a Swedish finance and banking corporation founded by Sven Hagströmer and Mats Qviberg, and which is currently being liquidated after having had its banking licence revoked on August 28, 2010.
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Sven Hagströmer started a finance company in 1981, which became Hagströmer & Qviberg in 1990 when Mats Qviberg joined the company as a partner to Hagströmer.
In early 2010, HQ Bank closed down its trading activities, and realised a loss of 1.23 billion SEK in its trading portfolio. Losses were primarily related to the bank's derivatives trading, and since they vastly exceeded the bank's estimate of their portfolio's market risk (33 million SEK as of March 2010), this caught the attention of the Financial Supervisory Authority.
The Financial Supervisory Authority in Sweden revoked HQ's banking licence on 28 August 2010, citing “major deficiencies” in trading operations, and on 30 August applied to Stockholm district court to have the bank to be forced into liquidation.[1][2] On the same day, the court appointed a liquidator. On 3 September, Carnegie Investment Bank bought HQ Bank for 268 million SEK.[3]
HQ maintains division handling private banking for wealthy individuals, investment banking and mutual funds. Under 2006 it has started to market itself as HQ Bank, symbolising a shift towards banking away from its traditional finance-oriented operation. Its Russian based mutual fund is one of the best performing on the Swedish market.
Patrik Enblad is the Chief Executive Officer of the company and Mats Qviberg is Chairman of the Board of Directors.
Investment AB Öresund, controlled by Qviberg and Sven Hagströmer, is the largest individual shareholder with close to 24% of the shares. Mats Qviberg owns 5% and Hagströmer owns roughly 2%. The company is effectively controlled by them.