Hong Kong’s finance chief asks banks to help out businesses and homeowners
- Paul Chan meets key banks to discuss liquidity challenges small and medium-sized companies face and residents’ repayment of mortgage loans
The financial secretary has urged Hong Kong banks to ease the liquidity pressure faced by small and medium-sized businesses and help homeowners with their mortgage obligations, vowing authorities would provide assistance for cases that prove difficult.
Paul Chan Mo-po said on Wednesday he met key banks in the morning to discuss issues SMEs faced with their liquidity and Hongkongers’ repayment of mortgages, with representatives of the lenders agreeing with the importance of supporting the businesses.
The minister has been placing pressure on banks since March in a bid to persuade them to help SMEs and mortgage holders amid the double whammy of weak consumption and a lacklustre stock and property markets in the city.
“I hope that banks will ensure that their policies to support small and medium-sized enterprises can also be implemented in frontline services,” he said on his social media page.
“As for individual more complex and difficult cases, the [Hong Kong Monetary Authority] will communicate with banks to follow up and provide assistance.”
Hong Kong homeowners have suffered a sharp depreciation of real estate assets following a drop in transactions in the market in recent months. In June, for example, official statistics showed home transactions shrank 30.5 per cent month on month while sales value contracted 35 per cent.