HONG KONG: A government survey has found that more people are becoming optimistic that business conditions will improve in Hong Kong, with the financing and insurance sector standing out as having the most favorable business outlook, followed by the retail sector and the real estate sector.

According to the results of the Quarterly Business Tendency Survey for the first quarter by the Census and Statistics Department released on Friday, more respondents expect their business situation to be better (29 percent), as compared to those expecting it to be worse (10 percent), in the first quarter of 2010 over the fourth quarter of 2009.

The proportion of respondents expecting their business situation in the first quarter 2010 on balance to be worse than that in the preceding quarter has decreased to 10 percent, as compared with 17 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009.

Analyzed by sector, respondents in all of the surveyed sectors have a favorable business outlook for the first quarter of 2010.

In particular, significantly more respondents in the finance and insurance, retail, real estate, and professional and business services sectors expect their volume of business to increase, as against those expecting it to decrease.

Moreover, more respondents in the finance and insurance, real estate, construction, retail, and transportation, storage and courier services sectors expect their employment to increase, as compared to those expecting it to decrease. On the other hand, more respondents in the manufacturing sector expect their employment levels to decrease, as compared with those expecting it to increase.

A government spokesman cautioned that the results of the survey should be interpreted with care.

"In this type of survey of expectations, the views collected in the survey are affected by the events in the community occurring around the time of enumeration, and it is difficult to establish precisely the extent to which respondents' perception of the future accords with the underlying trends," he said.

The government said the survey gathers views on short-term business performance from the senior management of about 560 prominent establishments in various sectors in Hong Kong, with a view to providing a quick reference, with minimum time lag, for predicting the short-term future economic performance of the local economy.

China Daily

(HK Edition 01/23/2010 page2)