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Following is the transcript of remarks by the Financial Secretary, Mr John C Tsang, at a media session at the lobby of West Wing, Central Government Offices, Tamar, today (December 19):
Reporter: Mr Tsang, the impact on Hong Kong. Are we already feeling the impact and any sort of capital outflow, and any plans to lift the property taxing measures?
Financial Secretary: We are experiencing a bit of volatility as you can see in the stock market this morning. We expect the volatility will continue for some time. We haven't seen any outflow of liquidity as yet, so we have to monitor the situation closely.
Reporter: What sort of advice do you have for the people of Hong Kong?
Financial Secretary: I think investors and enterprises should be careful about the volatility and in terms of the investment, they should take a long, longer-term view.
Reporter: Any kind of capital outflow, and how will the Government be coping with the situation?
Financial Secretary: Well, we haven't seen any outflow yet, as I have said earlier, but we have mentioned to the banks, asked them to tighten their lending arrangements so that when outflow does occur they would be better prepared.
Reporter: So there are no plans to lift the property taxing measures?
Financial Secretary: We haven't passed it yet. So we need to pass it first.
(Please also refer to the Chinese portion of the transcript.)
Ends/Thursday, December 19, 2013
Issued at HKT 15:25
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