Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing (李嘉誠), warned that Shanghai’s new free-trade zone will have a “big impact” on Hong Kong, urging the territory to up its game to avoid losing out, his office said yesterday.
China will allow unfettered exchange of its yuan currency in its first free-trade zone, according to draft plans revealed exclusively by Agence France-Presse earlier this month, in a bold push to reform the world’s second largest economy.
The proposals showed the new Shanghai zone as an international trade and financial center, which analysts say would challenge the free economy of Hong Kong.
The free-trade zone “will have a big impact on Hong Kong,” Li said, in a summary of remarks issued by his office yesterday.
“The free convertibility of the yuan will be favorable in the development of Shanghai,” he said.
“If Hong Kong does not catch up, it will lag behind others,” Li said, adding that Hong Kong’s GDP is already lower than that of Singapore.
When asked if Shanghai could catch up with Hong Kong within five to 10 years, he said: “I do not want to predict. But it will be faster than most people expect.”
Li, 85, also warned that the pro-democracy movement Occupy Central could harm the economy.
“It will have a negative impact on the economy and will affect Hong Kong’s image as an international finance center,” he said.
After starting out in business as a maker of plastic flowers, Li now commands a vast empire through Cheung Kong Holdings Ltd (長江實業) and Hutchison Whampoa Ltd (和記黃埔), with global assets in property, telecoms, utilities, ports and retail. He has a net worth of about US$31 billion, according to Forbes magazine.
Reports that he is selling his Hong Kong-based supermarket chain ParknShop have triggered fears he was going to pull his businesses out of the territory. However, he has pledged not to leave Hong Kong.
“I love Hong Kong, I love the country. Cheung Kong and Hutchison Whampoa won’t be moved away from Hong Kong,” he said.
Li initially made the comments at a press lunch on Tuesday.
The draft free-trade zone plan for Shanghai showed the new zone would support the establishment of foreign and joint venture banks and welcome privately funded financial institutions.
At present, China’s banking sector is overwhelmingly dominated by state-run institutions.
HORMUZ ISSUE: The US president said he expected crude prices to drop at the end of the war, which he called a ‘minor excursion’ that could continue ‘for a little while’ The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait started reducing oil production, as the near-closure of the crucial Strait of Hormuz ripples through energy markets and affects global supply. Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (ADNOC) is “managing offshore production levels to address storage requirements,” the company said in a statement, without giving details. Kuwait Petroleum Corp said it was lowering production at its oil fields and refineries after “Iranian threats against safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz.” The war in the Middle East has all but closed Hormuz, the narrow waterway linking the Persian Gulf to the open seas,
Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday said the DRAM supply crunch could extend through 2028, as the artificial intelligence (AI) boom has led the world’s major memory makers to dramatically reduce production of standard DRAM and allocate a significant portion of their capacity for high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips. The most severe supply constraints would stretch to the first half of next year due to “very limited” increases in new DRAM capacity worldwide, Nanya Technology president Lee Pei-ing (李培瑛) told a news briefing. The company plans to increase monthly 12-inch wafer capacity to 20,000 in the first half of 2028 after a
Taiwan has enough crude oil reserves for more than 100 days and sufficient natural gas reserves for more than 11 days, both above the regulatory safety requirement, Minister of Economic Affairs Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) said yesterday, adding that the government would prioritize domestic price stability as conflicts in the Middle East continue. Overall, energy supply for this month is secure, and the government is continuing efforts to ensure sufficient supply for next month, Kung told reporters after meeting with representatives from business groups at the ministry in Taipei. The ministry has been holding daily cross-ministry meetings at the Executive Yuan to ensure
RATIONING: The proposal would give the Trump administration ample leverage to negotiate investments in the US as it decides how many chips to give each country US officials are debating a new regulatory framework for exporting artificial intelligence (AI) chips and are considering requiring foreign nations to invest in US AI data centers or security guarantees as a condition for granting exports of 200,000 chips or more, according to a document seen by Reuters. The rules are not yet final and could change. They would be the first attempt to regulate the flow of AI chips to US allies and partners since US President Donald Trump’s administration said it rescinded its predecessor’s so-called AI diffusion rules. Those rules sought to keep a significant amount of AI
RSS