Hong Kong retail sales fell by the lowest rate in October in more than a year.
Provisional figures released by the Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) show a decline of 2.9 per cent year-on-year, following a 4 per cent revised decline in September, (the original estimate was 4.1 per cent).
“The year-on-year rate of decline in retail sales narrowed further in October, mirroring the similar performance of visitor arrivals in that month,” said a government spokesman commenting on the figures.
“The stable job market and increasing household incomes also rendered support to local consumer sentiment.”
The value of total retail sales in October was provisionally estimated at HK$36.1 billion. For the first 10 months of 2016 retail sales decreased by 8.9 per cent compared with the same period in 2015.
Perhaps most significant was the clear bottoming-out of sales of jewellery, watches and clocks and valuable gifts after more than 18 months of heavy decline – the single biggest contributing category to the monthly retail sales data. Those sales edged down by a mere 0.1 per cent year-on-year in October.
Electrical goods did most of the damage – down 21.7 per cent,while books and stationery were down 4.3 per cent and optical goods down 2.1 per cent. Medicines and cosmetics sales fell 1.8 per cent.
On the positive side, the value of sales of commodities in supermarkets increased by 3.5 per cent and food, liquor and tobacco sales rose by 1 per cent. Footwear and accessories sales rose by 4.9 per cent and furniture and fixtures by 2.8 per cent.
After netting out the effect of price changes over the same period, the provisional estimate of the volume of total retail sales in October 2016 decreased by 2.7 per cent. The revised estimate of the volume of total retail sales in September 2016 decreased by 3.8 per cent. For the first 10 months of 2016, total retail sales decreased by 7.8 per cent in volume.
The government spokesman said that looking ahead, the near-term outlook for retail sales will still hinge on the performance of inbound tourism “as well as the extent to which local consumer sentiment will be affected by the various external uncertainties”.