Finance
Strong Hong Kong dollar weighing on tourist spending: finance chief Paul Chan
“But the external environment remains complicated and there are a lot of uncertainties,” Chan said in his weekly blog. “The US Federal Reserve last week held interest rates steady. Coupled with stubborn inflation, the market expectation for a rate cut has weakened compared with earlier this year.”
He said the conditions could “bring adverse impacts to global economic recovery, Hong Kong’s exports, as well as the sentiment of local investment and capital markets”.
The Fed announced last week it was holding its benchmark lending rate steady in the 5.25 per cent to 5.5 per cent range as core inflation remained above the target of 2 per cent.
Chan said the city’s tourism sector was one of the key drivers of the economy in the first quarter, but warned of the drawbacks of a strengthening Hong Kong dollar, which is pegged to the US dollar.
The number of arrivals for the first three days of the Labour Day “golden week” holiday reached nearly 650,000, up by 25 per cent against last year’s figures, he said.
The break runs from May 1 to 5 on the mainland.
He said “changing consumption patterns among locals and tourists”, coupled with the strong Hong Kong dollar, could hit the retailing and catering sectors in particular.
Chan urged companies to develop new products and to embrace technology.
“New products can not only meet the changing needs of consumers, but also create demand and thus boost sales,” he said. “As for new ways of management, companies can lower costs and enhance efficiency by adopting more digital solutions.”
Chan was attending the annual meeting of the board of governors of the Asian Development Bank in Tbilisi, Georgia, which is themed “From Billions to Trillions – Promoting Private Sector Development for Climate Change”.
He said many participants were interested in the development of Hong Kong’s digital economy, as well as the innovation and technology sector.
Chan said at the plenary session a huge funding gap of trillions of US dollars existed for climate and transition investments, as well as in helping developed and developing economies in climate financing.
He urged members to work together to mobilise private sector resources and channel funds to support green and climate transition projects through innovative financial products and services.
In his weekly blog post, Chan also noted Hong Kong’s gross domestic product had increased for five consecutive quarters, expanding 2.7 per cent year-on-year in the first three months of the year.
The city’s benchmark Hang Seng Index also gained almost 14 per cent recently, while the property market had become more active after authorities scrapped cooling measures in February.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/adn/3TY7DABTNZRZCZMWBADLY2QNKQ.jpg "Climate change destroyed a Southwest Alaska village. Its residents are starting over in a new town.")
Stocks traded mixed on Friday but closed the week on a high as investors embraced an inflation report seen as crucial to the Federal Reserve’s next decision on interest rate cuts.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average (^DJI) gained 0.3% and finished with a fresh record. The S&P 500 (^GSPC) lost 0.1%, but is coming off a record-high close from the prior session. Meanwhile, the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite (^IXIC) sank about 0.4%.
Despite the mixed trading on Friday, the stock gauges all recorded wins for the week after confidence in the economy returned to the market. The Dow and the S&P added about 0.7%, while the Nasdaq rose 1%.
A solid GDP reading, combined with continued cooling in inflation, has cemented growing conviction that the Fed can nail a “soft landing” as it embarks on a rate-cutting campaign.
The August reading of the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) index, the inflation metric favored by the Fed, showed continued cooling in price pressures. The “core” PCE index, which is most closely watched by policymakers, rose 0.1% month over month, lower than Wall Street forecasts.
The PCE reading appeared to goose up bets on another jumbo-sized rate cut from the Fed next month. More than half of traders — around 52% — now expect a 50 basis point cut.
Read more: What the Fed rate cut means for bank accounts, CDs, loans, and credit cards
Elsewhere, China added to its stream of stimulus measures, boosting markets once again. Mainland stocks scored their biggest weekly win since 2008, and luxury stocks are set for their best week in years as hopes for Chinese demand rise. Meanwhile, shares of Alibaba (BABA, 9988.HK), JD.com (JD, 9618.HK), and Meituan (3690.HK, MPNGY) surged amid the buying spree.
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Zuckerberg faces deposition in AI copyright lawsuit from Sarah Silverman and other authors
One of the most important debates sparked over the sudden rise of generative AI tools is whether the process of training large language models using existing artistic works is a new form of copyright infringement.
An array of authors, media outlets and other creative professionals have sued to stop AI companies from using their content on the internet, arguing that their works are being used without compensation in order to advance a new technology and market opportunities.
Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg will soon play a direct role in one of the most important lawsuits tackling this subject. Earlier this week a US District Court judge overseeing a suit brought by authors including Sarah Silverman and Ta-Nehisi Coates rejected Meta’s bid to prevent the deposition of Zuckerberg, the Associated Press reported Friday.
Meta had tried to block Zuckerberg’s deposition by arguing that he does not have unique knowledge of the company’s AI operations and other Meta employees could provide the same information. Zuckerberg’s participation will likely draw even more attention to the legal matter, similar to his high-profile appearances on Capitol Hill during Congressional hearings on the role of social media in society.
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New PCE reading supports case for smaller Fed rate cut in November
Change in core PCE since 2018 A fresh reading on inflation Friday keeps the Federal Reserve on track to continue cutting interest rates this fall, likely in 25 basis point increments, reports Yahoo Finance’s Jennifer Schonberger.
The result means that a bigger 50 basis point cut may be hard to justify at the Fed’s next meeting in November, according to some Fed watchers.
The fact that core inflation year-over-year is holding the level of the last two months, and not dropping, lines up more with a scenario for a smaller cut — lest the job market substantially weaken between now and November.
“The core year-over-year at 2.7% suggests that another round of 50 basis points needs to come under careful scrutiny unless the labor market suggests weakness,” said Quincy Krosby, chief global strategist for LPL Financial.
The consensus among Fed officials outlined last week is for two more 25 basis point rate cuts in 2024.
Read more here
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Wall Street is digesting this morning’s release of the latest Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) data, the Federal Reserve’s preferred measure of inflation. Meanwhile, Costco (COST) shares are under pressure following the wholesale retail giant’s latest quarterly results. Despite recent increases in membership fees, the company fell short of sales expectations. Yahoo Finance’s trending tickers include BlackBerry Limited (BB), SuperMicro Computer (SMCI), and Coinbase (COIN).
Key guests include:
9:05 a.m. ET : Tiffany Wilding, PIMCO Managing Director and Economist
9:30 a.m. ET Angelo Kourkafas, Edward Jones Senior Investment Strategist
10:15 a.m. ET Rich Lesser, BCG Global Chair
10:45 a.m. ET Stuart Kaiser, Citi Head of U.S. Equity Trading Strategy
11:30 a.m. ET Ed Hallen, Klaviyo Chief Product Officer & Co-Founder
Biodiversity-related projects have seen an increase in international funding in recent years, but remain a low priority compared to other development initiatives, according to a new report from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
The report found total official development finance (ODF) for such projects grew from $7.3 billion in 2015 to $15.4 billion in 2022. That’s still less than what the nearly 200 governments that signed the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) in December 2022 agreed would be needed to halt biodiversity loss: at least $20 billion annually by 2025, and $30 billion annually by 2030.
Government funding made up the bulk of the ODF for biodiversity-related projects in the OECD report, which is welcome news, Campaign for Nature (CfN), a U.S.-based advocacy group, said in a statement.
“We welcome the increase in international biodiversity finance reported in 2022 but that good news is tempered by a range of concerns,” Mark Opel, finance lead at CfN, told Mongabay.
One concern, CfN notes, is that funding specifically for biodiversity as a principal objective declined from $4.6 billion in 2015 to $3.8 billion in 2022. CfN reviewed hundreds of projects from 2022, which formed the source for the OECD’s report, and found that many either had vague descriptions or focused on other policies like agriculture but were counted toward protecting or restoring nature.
“We need to see more emphasis on funding with a primary focus on biodiversity,” Opel said. “So-called ‘principal’ funding that has biodiversity as its primary goal continues to be down since its 2015 peak. Increases in this type of funding are essential to meet the goals of the GBF … These goals cannot be met through funding with biodiversity as only a ‘significant’ goal that mainstreams biodiversity into projects with other primary goals like humanitarian aid or agriculture.”
The report also found that funding for biodiversity-related activities represent just 2-7% of the total ODF portfolio.
“It is concerning that biodiversity considerations still represent a relatively low share of the total official development assistance,” Markus Knigge, executive director of Germany-based nonprofit foundation Blue Action Fund, told Mongabay. He added it was also problematic that most funding came via loans, which have to be repaid, rather than grants, which are often more appropriate for conservation finance.
CfN says grants are preferable to loans because they don’t add to the debt burden of low-income recipient countries.
At the same time, development funding from major donors such as Germany, France, EU institutions, the U.S. and Japan have been cut in recent years.
“We have seen minimal announcements of new international biodiversity finance since [the GBF signing],” Opel said. “We estimate that only the equivalent of $162 million annually has been pledged since [then], which doesn’t come close to filling the $4.6 billion gap between the $15.4 billion in 2022 and the $20 billion commitment in 2025.”
Banner image: Javan lutung by Rhett A. Butler/Mongabay.
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