Turkish lender Isbank is considering buying HSBC's branches in Pakistan, Isbank deputy chief executive Erdal Aral told Reuters on Thursday.

An HSBC spokesperson told WealthBriefingAsia: "HSBC is in early stage discussions regarding the possible sale of its operation in Pakistan. Further announcements will be made if or when necessary."

Aral also said that plans for acquiring a bank in Azerbaijan and opening branches in Baghdad, Kosovo and Batumi, Georgia, will become clearer in July or August. Talks on buying a bank in Egypt continue, he added, cited by the newswire.

Isbank could not be reached for comment.

Last year the UK-headquartered bank outlined plans to cull 3,000 jobs in Hong Kong as part of a cost-cutting strategy, and exited retail and private banking divisions in South Korea, Japan and Thailand. But at an investor meeting last month, chief executive Stuart Gulliver insisted that the bank's commitment to wealth management in Asia was stronger than ever.

“Wealth management is core to Hong Kong, it's core to the UK, and it’s core to 18 other markets," said Gulliver at the conference.

"There are 18 countries where we have a (wealth management) presence. What we’ve done by exiting places like Korea and Japan is to get out of mass retail banking in countries where we don’t have the size and scale to compete against the domestic banks who are also doing mass retail banking. If you take Japan for example, we can’t compete with the indigenous Japanese lenders."

"But wealth is a tremendous opportunity for us in many parts of Asia, like Australia, Singapore and Malaysia. We are in the part of the world which will see disproportionate GDP growth, and so huge wealth creation over the next few years.”