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Our French bank (Crédit Agricole) had us fill out a form recently (I forget why, but possibly just to fix our address); it had a blank for our TIN. We don't have French numbers yet, so couldn't oblige - it didn't seem to be a problem.

Ta,

Hi celticman,
It's not for selling. If you are under more than one tax jurisdiction banks are now obliged to give details to the tax authorities in the countries where you are registered. I believe that HSBC started with this this summer. If you have a French tax return or even just pay taxe foncière the number needed by HSBC is the "Numéro fiscal" in the box "Vos références" on the Avis d'impot. 13 digits only, no letter needed.
Regards
dashnieuil

Apparently, you are receiving money from another bank, and therefore HSBC is interested in where you have the money from. That is, HSBC thinks that you may have a business that has an unregistered EIN, or let's say you don't have a business and work for a company that doesn't pay taxes, so you need to provide them with your TIN. But there is no need to worry because now there are services that make TIN or EIN based on your data. I recently used such a service -- to register an EIN. I think they will make you a TIN and send your data to HSBC without a problem.

It's easy.  Just go to IRS.gov and click on the apply for an EIN link. 
Cheers