HONG KONG-Hong Kong exports slumped at the largest pace in a decade in 2019, although the city’s exports ended 13 consecutive months of declines in December.
The city’s exports tumbled 4.1 percent in 2019, the worst performance in the last 10 years. However, the faltering export sector registered an annual hike of 3.3 percent in exports in December, topping market forecasts.
The Hong Kong Trade Development Council anticipates that exports are poised to fall 2 percent in 2020, given the lingering overall uncertainty of the global economic environment.
Buoyed by the signing of the “first phase” trade agreement between the world’s two largest economies and the lower base of comparison, the city’s export growth turned from negative to positive in December.
“If there are no more new US tariffs levied on Chinese imports, we expect the fall of Hong Kong exports will narrow and the city’s export growth will be negative 2 percent this year,” said Nicholas Kwan, the Hong Kong Trade Development Council’s director of research, in a radio interview on Friday.
Meanwhile, Dah Shing Bank warned that if the coronavirus outbreak continues, the negative consequences on Hong Kong exports will be seen in February as mainland manufacturers delay their normal operation.
The Hong Kong stock market fell on Friday as the World Health Organization declared a global health emergency over the epidemic.
The city’s Hang Seng Index fell 136 points, or 0.52 percent, to close at 26,312. The equity market dived more than 1,600 points, or 5.9 percent, this week after the market resumed trading after the Lunar New Year holiday.
Airlines around the world are either suspending or paring back services in and out of China following cases of human-to-human transmission outside the country, while manufacturers have been cutting their operations on the mainland.
US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said the coronavirus outbreak poses a new risk to growth in China and elsewhere.
