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Following is the transcript of remarks by the Financial Secretary, Mr John C Tsang, after attending a radio programme today (March 2):
Reporter: (about US economy)
Financial Secretary: I didn't know that they were not going to have an agreement on the sequester issue but I don't think that would lead the US into a recession. So far the US recovery has been quite good, and housing sale and so forth has been quite positive, so I think for all the advanced economies, the US is better off than many other countries. The European situation is more worrying, the Japanese situation is more uncertain, so I am hopeful the US situation will not get worse than the others, but we have already taken into consideration the international situation how that would affect the Hong Kong's economy.
Reporter:(about economic forecast)
Financial Secretary: Perhaps, but what I would have done in terms of the forecast, the economic forecast, I have put in a wider range than I had before, so now we are looking at 1.5 to 3.5, it's a two-point range rather than a one-point range that I have used previously.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Saturday, March 2, 2013
Issued at HKT 13:46
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