Hong Kong ‘pushing for deeper ties with Middle East, China’ to bring in new capital

Chan also said that Hong Kong was a small, fully open and export-oriented economy that was highly susceptible to external changes, meaning it needed to seek out new opportunities.

“We must work hard to find new partners and open up new markets and enhance the resilience of economies and financial markets,” he said.

The summit will host more than 120 speakers, comprising policymakers, financiers, academics and business leaders from the mainland, Hong Kong, the Middle East, Europe, the United States and Southeast Asia.

The event is expected to touch on megatrends, such as urbanisation and digitalisation in Asia.

Chan characterised the conference as a high-level summit, pointing to the attendance of Saudi government officials and representatives for the country’s sovereign wealth fund, the Public Investment Fund.

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Future Investment Initiative Institute chief executive Richard Attias earlier said Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the head of the wealth fund that boasts more than US$700 billion in assets, would lead the Saudi delegation to Hong Kong.

The delegation would also include Princess Reema bint Bandar Al Saud, who serves as the country’s ambassador to the US, as well as Saudi investment minister Khalid Al-Falih, he added.

Attias noted that about 1,000 people had registered to join the event as of November 24.

Chan on Sunday said he would attend the summit and join other speakers for a plenary session on how to deepen global economic partnerships to ensure more inclusive and sustainable development.

Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu is also expected to attend the opening ceremony, while Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing chairwoman Laura Cha Shih May-lung is among local financial leaders set to join the event.

Finance chief Chan stressed the importance of taking a measured policy approach to trade amid geopolitical tensions and global economic headwinds.

“We need to recognise the situation clearly, respond calmly, make good use of our advantages, seize potential opportunities, and move forward firmly and steadily on the challenging road ahead,” he said.

Chan said the debut marked the internationalisation of the local ETF market. In the first 10 months of this year, the market’s average daily turnover grew 25 per cent to HK$11.6 billion compared with the same period last year.

“Since the beginning of this year, the performance of the Hong Kong stock market has been restrained to a certain extent by such factors as high interest rates globally, geopolitical tensions, and uncertainty in economic recoveries,” he said. “But the ETF, for example, did well.”

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The minister also called on the city to expand business ties with the mainland, pointing to memorandum of understandings to boost cooperation in financial services that were signed during the fifth plenary session of the Hong Kong-Beijing Cooperation Conference last Wednesday.

Hong Kong University of Science and Technology professor Ceajer Chan Ka-keung, who previously served as the local treasury minister, said China would remain the city’s mainstay market, even as new growth sources arose in the Middle East and among the Asean economies.

The Association of Southeast Asian Nations comprises Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia.

The International Monetary Fund has forecast that the Asean bloc will replace Germany as the world’s fourth-largest economy by 2030.

It also noted that Asia had recorded 4.6 per cent economic growth this year, bringing it above the world average and contributing two-thirds of the global economy.