David Webb
The founder of webb-site.com, former banker David Webb is a prominent advocate for better transparency and corporate governance in Hong Kong. His database of who’s who in Hong Kong contains more than 100,000 names and tracks appointments to government advisory bodies, shedding light on potential conflicts of interest. He talks to Sarah Fung about the competition law, the housing bubble and the economic future of Hong Kong and the mainland.
We are in a bubble. The correct approach to a bubble is to not buy into it, but to be patient. The market is really sending you a signal if the bank tells you that you can’t afford a home. And if we try too hard [to buy a home] we’ll end up like the U.S. housing market with large-scale defaults and foreclosures.
I think that prices will come down when interest rates start going up. It might be three years but there will be a point when you can see that roadblock at the end of the tunnel, as it were.
There is increasing intervention in the economy by the government, which disrupts free choice.
They [the government] are flailing around without good policy. There’s a basic right to buy and sell property in the Basic Law. And when you start penalizing people for exercising those Basic Law rights then you are diminishing those rights.
A free market only functions if there is a level playing field and rules of fair play, which includes not allowing someone to corner a market and beat the hell out of it.
Freedom requires the rule of law, including an independent judiciary and a proper competition law, and that includes not allowing competitors to get together and fix prices.