Switzerland's Zurich and Geneva remained the world's most expensive cities, in contrast to Tokyo, which enjoyed the lowest prices among developed-market peers, while Hong Kong retained its top spot as the most expensive property market, a report by Deutsche Bank showed on Wednesday.
The report, Mapping the World's Prices–2026, found that Zurich and Geneva remain the most expensive cities in the world, followed by Tel Aviv, New York, and San Francisco.
It highlighted that Israel's Tel Aviv became more expensive in US dollar terms partly due to its stronger currency, the shekel, while the resilience of Israel's tech and defence sectors, regional shortages, and the impact of conflict also push up its ranking.
Currently, Tel Aviv is the most expensive city in the world to buy a McDonald's meal, it added.
Meanwhile, Hong Kong remained as the world's most expensive housing market despite a 10 percent price decline from pre-pandemic levels, with a price of US$27,753 (HK$216,473.4) per square meter to buy an apartment in the city centre, followed by Zurich, Seoul, Singapore and Geneva.
The elevated housing costs dragged down Hong Kong's ranking in the quality-of-life index, down from 48th place a year ago to 55th, while pollution and long commutes also weighed on the score.
Notably, Japan, once known for extremely high costs, now sits in the middle or lower half of many developed-market price tables in US dollar terms, with its purchasing power parity dropping sharply from 173 in the mid-1990s to a mere 60 now.
The island country saw its yen fall 51 percent since 2012, but the inflation only rose 20 percent during the period, coupled with subdued wage growth, resulting in its relatively low prices internationally.
Japan is the cheapest place in the world to buy an iPhone, accounting for taxes, and its housing costs are nearly a third of Hong Kong and Seoul, and half that of London.
Deutsche Bank's report covers 69 cities across 6 continents, with prices converted to US dollars, to research quality of life, rental costs, salary, and so on.
