Bank brand films love a metaphor that looks expensive. HSBC’s “The Right Wave” goes further: it films one of the world’s most dangerous reef breaks and asks you to read a jet-ski tow-in as a relationship with your bank. Shot at Teahupoo, Tahiti, the :60 hero on the official HSBC YouTube channel (Nk4t93PT60w, uploaded September 22, 2026) lands as the new chapter of a global trust platform – trade coverage from LBB, Creative Salon, and shots in late September 2026.
WHAT HAPPENS ON SCREEN
The spot opens with a location card over a hollow Teahupoo barrel – “Teahupo’o Tahiti” plus coordinates – so you know this is not a stock-wave plate. Water fills the frame: foam, mist, and a face of blue that reads as consequence, not postcard. Cut close on a grip in the wash – one arm in a dark wetsuit sleeve locked by another hand – the literal partnership beat before anyone stands up.
Then the ride. Surfer Matahi Drollet (credited in LBB / Creative Salon) carves a towering wall; spray blooms off the lip; a barrel shot puts him inside the tube with a red-tinged board as the only warm accent. Jet-ski driver Tahurai Henry is the other half of the story – the tow partner who puts the surfer on the right section, then rides with him across a golden-hour Tahiti skyline as mountains silhouette and the HSBC hexagon locks up. Official YouTube copy frames the thesis: navigating unpredictable markets is not about chasing every opportunity; it is about catching the right one, with “over 160 years of global expertise and local insight.”
CREDITS
Brand: HSBC. Campaign / film: The Right Wave (also discussed under the wider “We’re There” trust platform in shots). Format: :60 hero brand film on official verified HSBC YouTube (@hsbc), video ID Nk4t93PT60w, upload dated September 22, 2026; cutdowns for digital, social, streaming, and inflight noted by LBB. Agency: Team Helix / VML UK with VML Lisbon; media OMG Media (LBB, Creative Salon). Production: Superprime; director Kiku Ohe; DP Tim Lorentzen; underwater camera Morgan Maassen; local service We Are Ora / Hinatea Boosie. Talent: Matahi Drollet (surfer), Tahurai Henry (jet ski). Editorial: tenthree / Stephen Dunne. VFX: Electric Theatre Collective. Grade: Company 3 / Yoomin Lee. Music: Wake the Town (original composition) with music supervision Sam MacNamara; audio credits also list IXYXI and Runamok on the director’s cut path per Creative Salon. HSBC brand side named in trade: CMO John McDonald; Donata Peksa (global head of brand campaigns / head of brand experience). VML CCO Ryan McManus quoted across LBB and shots. A longer documentary on the pair is promised later per LBB – not reviewed here.
THE EXECUTION
Ohe’s coverage problem is the right one for a bank: you cannot fake Teahupoo at 25 feet and expect the metaphor to stick. The film sells patience – waiting for the swell, the grip before the drop, the ski that puts you on the section – then lets the wave do the expensive work. That is smarter than a talking-head “trust us” VO. When the location card and coordinates hit early, the spot is arguing for specificity: local knowledge at a famous break as proof of “local insight,” global bank as the ski that has done this before.
Craft is where HSBC spends. Superprime / We Are Ora production, Lorentzen and Maassen lenses, Electric Theatre Collective finish, Company 3 grade – the water looks heavy enough that the partnership line does not need a joke. McManus’s quoted line (“nobody can take on giant waves alone”) is the creative brief made billboard-simple. Peksa’s trade quotes push the same ambition: trusted bank, customers at the center, volatility as weather. For a financial category that often defaults to kinetic type and stock cities, shooting a real tow-in relationship is a cleaner visual system.
WHY IT WORKS AND WHERE IT FAILS
It works because the metaphor is almost too neat – and the footage earns the neatness. A surfer who trusts the ski driver is a sharper “trusted partner” emblem than a handshake in glass offices. Publishing on the verified HSBC channel clears the DailyCommercials bar after a week of fan reuploads elsewhere, and the late-September LBB / Creative Salon / shots package gives a full credit stack instead of rumor.
It strains where bank films always strain. Equating market risk with a reef that can kill you is dramatic; it is also a category cliche if you have seen enough “storm / mountain / ocean = volatility” reels. Product is absent by design – no app demo, no rate, no SME case – so the :60 is pure equity. If you want HSBC to prove the partnership beyond poetry, you need the cutdowns and the later documentary to do retail work this hero refuses. Viewers who clock every luxury-surf brand film of the last decade may also shrug: beautiful water, familiar thesis.
For DailyCommercials, this is the midday financial file against this morning’s M&M’S Screentime snack comedy: different category, official YouTube, cited VML / Superprime credits, no prior “Right Wave” or Teahupoo HSBC review on the site (older HSBC posts such as Dear Customer are separate campaigns).
WATCH IT HERE
DailyCommercials Score: 7.6/10. A high-craft Teahupoo trust film that makes the ski-and-surfer partnership feel earned – strong on place and production, light on banking proof, familiar as volatility metaphor.
Would you trust a bank that films itself as the jet ski – or do you need the rate sheet before you catch the wave? Tell us in the comments.
