Former Clydesdale banker Alison McGregor has been appointed HSBC's new chief executive in Scotland.

The bank said Ms McGregor would be "responsible for engaging with the Scottish Government, development bodies and business groups to help realise the potential of the Scottish market."

The appointment comes at a time of competitive movement, with the replacement of Lloyds by TSB as well as the possible retrenchment of the Co-operative.

Ms McGregor said: "The stated objective of Scottish Enterprise is to make Scotland a more globally competitive market."

She highlighted the HSBC's 6600 global offices and its mission to "collaborate internally and externally with public bodies and industry", adding: "Scotland and its economy are important to HSBC, we employ 3200 people here and have invested heavily over the last two or three years."

HSBC has opened three corporate and commercial banking centres in Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen, almost doubling its commercial and international banking specialists in a £10 million programme.

Last year, the bank reported SME lending up 25%, lending to corporate businesses up 32%, a 17.5% increase in Premier customers and a 25% rise in the value of mortgage lending.

Antonio Simoes, head of the UK Bank and deputy chief executive of HSBC Bank, said: "Scotland is an important for HSBC, we continue to increase lending to Scottish businesses."

Ms McGregor joined HSBC four months ago as director of corporate banking, UK North, a role she will now combine with her Scottish responsibilities.

She lives in the West of Scotland and will work out of Glasgow, with overall responsibility for HSBC's corporate banking centres across Scotland, North West England, Yorkshire and the Midlands.

She was previously regional then national director of corporate, structured and acquisition finance for Clydesdale Bank.

Prior to that, she worked for Barclays for over 20 years, latterly as head of corporate and commercial banking and deputy managing director for Scotland.

She takes over from Doug Baikie, head of corporate banking in Scotland, who will now concentrate on his corporate role.