Despite Occupy protests, Hong Kong's financial centre status is assured
David Meyer says London and New York have survived much worse than the Occupy protests
Many commentators have argued that the Occupy movement has damaged Hong Kong's status as Asia's leading financial centre. The protests highlight the continued control that China exerts over the electoral process in Hong Kong, even though the steps in this process are set out in the Basic Law.
Some see this control as detrimental to the freedom that financiers and their firms require to operate in a leading global centre.
The presumed negative consequences of the protests range from bad publicity that encourages global financial firms to seek an alternative operational base, to intensified concern about Hong Kong's future as a financial centre, to fears that Beijing leaders will penalise the city and shift support to an alternative centre such as Shanghai.
The likelihood of these negative consequences coming to pass is negligible.
To understand why the protests have little probability of undermining Hong Kong as Asia's global financial centre, we need to examine the foundation of the city's status. It is the home for Asia's greatest agglomeration of sophisticated decision-makers who control the exchange of capital within the region and between it and the global economy.
This agglomeration was set in the late 19th century when the top trading and financial firms from outside Asia chose Hong Kong for their operational base for Asia.