Consumer confidence remains stable

Gordon Yang

Hong Kong's overall consumer confidence index hit 84.2 last quarter, up 7.5 percent from the previous quarter and down 2.8 percent year-on-year, according to a Hong Kong City University report.

The survey was conducted on 1,000 Hong Kong residents aged 18 or above from December 1 to 24 last year.

The index scoring range is from 0 to 200, with the lowest score of 0 indicating "no confidence at all," a score below 100 indicating "lack of confidence" and a score above 100 indicating "fairly confident."

The sub-index of Hong Kong people's confidence in stock investment stood at 91.1, a significant increase of 22.6 percent year-on-year and 23.1 percent quarter on quarter.

For the next three months, this sub-index also showed an increase of 19.1 percent to 91.2, indicating a significant rise in Hong Kong consumers' confidence in investing in stocks.

The sub-index in purchasing houses grew 10.4 percent to 70.9 but dropped 4.4 percent on a year-on-year basis, reflecting that consumers are the least confident when it comes to buying houses.

Confidence in consumption conditions remained relatively stable at 102.6, with a slight decrease of 0.4 percent, maintaining its position as the highest sub-index.

CityU also mentioned that in the fourth quarter of last year, the overall index increased compared to the previous quarter, mainly due to a rise in consumer confidence across five areas: stock investment, housing purchases, economic development, employment conditions and price conditions.