HSBC Bank Australia produces a lacklustre effort 04 August 2015 3:56PM John Kavanagh HSBC Bank Australia contributed US$206 million of pre-tax profit to HSBC plc group earnings in the six months to June. The result was up four per cent on the US$198 million of pre-tax profit the bank earned in the previous corresponding period but was 11.9 per cent down on the result in the December half.Revenue was US$421 million, compared with $420 million in the previous corresponding period.The retail banking and wealth management division's pre-tax profit fell heavily year-on-year, down from US$49 million in the June half last year to US$24 million in the latest half.The local operation was rescued by the global banking and markets division, which increased pre-tax profit from US$92 million to US$128 million year-on-year.The value of the mortgage book fell from US$10.2 billion to US$9.1 billion over the 12 months to June. Personal, property-related and commercial lending portfolios also lost ground.Customer account numbers fell from 20,803 in December to 18,214 in June.