HSBC chairman John Bond turns 64 this weekend and insiders and analysts think his birthday festivities could mark the start of a long-awaited game of boardroom musical chairs at the global bank.
Mr Bond, a courteous but steely Englishman, has never commented publicly on when he plans to retire but insiders at the world's third-largest bank say he is likely to bow out in 2006 with Stephen Green, currently CEO, the frontrunner to succeed him.
Mr Green, 56, became CEO two years ago and insiders say Michael Geoghegan, 51, the head of HSBC's UK business, is the likely candidate to replace him.
"The money at the moment is that Mr Green becomes chairman and most likely Mr Geoghegan becomes CEO," one HSBC banker said.
A spokesman for HSBC declined to comment. The group's official retirement age is 65 but Mr Bond's predecessor William Purves left when he was 67.
Mr Bond, who joined the bank when he was 20, is universally viewed as a hard act to follow having shaken up HSBC's cautious lending approach via a slew of acquisitions.
But analysts say HSBC's tradition of nurturing internal talent - the 140-year-old company has never hired someone from outside to lead it - should ensure a smooth handover and they point to similar fears in 1998 that Mr Bond, who was chief executive prior to becoming chairman, could not match Mr Purves.
"What you would worry about would be if they started to bring in outsiders to run the business. It (Mr Green and Mr Geoghegan) is a very natural combination," said Simon Maughan, analyst at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein.
A fund manager who declined to be named said it made sense to appoint Mr Green chairman: "He is someone who seems to be well-regarded internally and externally".
Other candidates for chairman and CEO would include Douglas Flint, finance director, Vincent Cheng, chairman of HSBC's Asia unit and Stuart Gulliver, the co-head of HSBC's investment bank.
Mr Gulliver is seen by some insiders as Mr Geoghegan's main rival for CEO but the latter is thought to have the edge because he has more commercial banking experience and Mr Gulliver is halfway through a five-year plan to build up the investment bank.
HSBC usually has three possible candidates chalked against each of its top 50 positions.
The chairman's job at HSBC is to set strategy and act as the company powerbroker, cultivating relationships with movers and shakers, both political and corporate, around the globe.
The CEO concentrates on the operational side of things.
Mr Green, who used to head up HSBC's investment banking arm, is seen as a less polished player than Mr Bond but commentators say his analytical, mild-mannered style would work well with Mr Geoghegan, who has wasted no time in ordering thousands of job cuts and new sales targets since becoming head of the UK retail bank in 2004.
Mr Geoghegan's actions have raised the ire of HSBC staff. In May around 1,400 workers staged a one-day strike, the first at a UK bank in nearly a decade, in a disagreement over pay.
Previously Mr Geoghegan turned round failing lender Banco Bamerindus do Brasil after HSBC bought it in 1997.
Mr Geoghegan's hard-line shake-up of the UK business would suit him, analysts said, to a role more akin to Keith Whitson's, who was CEO before Mr Green and an operations man who took the job on the understanding he would not become chairman.
"John Bond has always maintained that the things to look for in a bank are the systems and the management," said Mr Maughan.
"He (Mr Bond) believes management depth and quality is evolving and improving throughout the group. I believe that Mr Geoghegan in particular is the man to watch on the board."
Britain's corporate governance code, revised in 2003, recommends against the promotion of chief executives to the chair in order to guarantee the post's independence.
Under the code's rules, if HSBC promotes Mr Green it will have to explain its decision.
Rival Barclays came under investor pressure to explain publicly why it appointed its former CEO chairman but fund managers said Mr Green's expected promotion was unlikely to raise as many eyebrows.
The size and complexity of HSBC - it has operations in 77 countries - mean that there is a plausible argument for someone with a good knowledge of the group becoming chairman. Also, unusually for the UK, the post is an executive one.
"While we generally have concerns about CEOs becoming chairmen of their companies we have signed up to the 'comply or explain' rule in the combined code," said Stuart Fowler, head of UK equities at Axa Investment Managers.
"We have been told by enough bank directors that it's harder than other industries to walk in and grasp the issues quickly. I'm sure HSBC will be sensitive to the need to explain."