Hong Kong exports fall again, weighing on economy’s outlook

HONG Kong’s exports fell again in July, as waning global demand and China’s slowing recovery continue to weigh on the city’s economy.

Overseas shipments dropped 9.1 per cent from a year earlier, the Census and Statistics Department said Thursday (Aug 24). That was worse than the median estimate of an 8.8 per cent decline in a Bloomberg survey of economists. Exports have been falling for more than a year.

Imports decreased 7.9 per cent, compared with economists’ expectation of a 5.9 per cent drop. The trade deficit was HK$30 billion (S$5.14 billion).

Exports to Asia for the month declined by 11.6 per cent from July 2022, a government spokesperson said in a statement accompanying the data. Shipments to mainland China plunged 15.2 per cent, while those to Japan, Korea, Malaysia and the Philippines also dropped by double-digit percentages. Exports to the US and the EU also shrank.

“The difficult external environment will continue to weigh on Hong Kong’s exports performance,” a government spokesperson said in a statement.

The city’s shipments overseas have struggled in the past year, as rising global inflation weighs on demand for goods, while a slowing economic recovery in mainland China also takes a toll. 

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The trade figures are an added challenge for Hong Kong’s economy, the outlook for which has grown less optimistic recently as the city’s post-pandemic activity boom loses some steam.

The authorities recently narrowed their economic growth forecast for the year to a range of 4 per cent to 5 per cent. That came after gross domestic product expanded 1.5 per cent in the April-to-June period from a year earlier, much weaker than economists had projected. BLOOMBERG