The quantum computing partnership forged between HSBC and IBM sent IBM's stock price soaring by nearly 6% in a single trading day, propelling its market capitalization up by almost $13 billion. Yet, analysts from Morgan Stanley have highlighted that the market's response was an overreaction, prematurely pricing in a commercialization scenario that may only come to fruition years down the line and is still shrouded in uncertainty. Based on model estimations, the market's reaction on that particular day equated to an expectation that IBM would sell roughly 265 quantum systems, each priced at $13.3 million, by 2029—a forecast built on numerous assumptions and fraught with uncertainty.
Utilizing IBM's Heron quantum processor, HSBC witnessed a 34% enhancement in its ability to forecast the success rates of client bids in the European corporate bond market, underscoring the vast potential of quantum computing within the financial realm. Despite IBM's undeniable leadership in the quantum computing arena, the commercialization journey of this technology is still in its nascent stages, with widespread commercial implementation likely several years in the making.