In the quiet arithmetic of modern banking, HSBC has chosen to shed what it no longer wishes to carry — not because the asset was failing, but because capital, like attention, must be directed. The British bank's $2.7 billion sale of its Singapore life and health insurance unit to Germany's Allianz on July 24 is less a retreat than a reorientation: HSBC steps back from manufacturing insurance while remaining in the room as its distributor, and Allianz claims a foothold in one of Asia's most guarded markets after a prior attempt was turned away at the door. What moves here is not merely money, b