{"id":687428,"date":"2026-01-10T20:09:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T20:09:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/687428\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T20:09:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T20:09:11","slug":"hong-kongs-finance-chief-confirms-early-surplus-vows-more-elderly-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/687428\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong\u2019s finance chief confirms early surplus, vows more elderly support"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Hong Kong\u2019s finance chief has confirmed the city will achieve an early operating account surplus thanks to strong financial market performance and increased stock trading stamp duty revenue, as he addressed calls for more welfare measures for the elderly at the first public forum for the coming budget.<\/p>\n<p>Financial Secretary <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/topics\/paul-chan?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"noopener\">Paul Chan Mo-po<\/a> vowed on Saturday to make the \u201cutmost\u201d efforts to address elderly residents\u2019 concerns over high living costs, while highlighting that authorities had not reduced public spending on the social welfare sector in the past financial year despite a budget deficit.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Chan was speaking to about 100 residents who attended a public forum to express their views ahead of the 2026-27 budget, scheduled to be unveiled in late February.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cDespite the trade war and rising geopolitical tensions last year, Hong Kong still recorded 3.2 per cent economic growth, with the economy now showing steady and orderly development,\u201d he told the forum.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cThanks to the financial market performance, we gained more [stock market] stamp duty, which enabled us to achieve [operating account] surplus earlier.\u201d<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">In last year\u2019s budget, Chan forecast the government\u2019s operating account would return to a surplus only in 2026-27 after recording a deficit for three consecutive years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hong Kong\u2019s finance chief has confirmed the city will achieve an early operating account surplus thanks to strong&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":687429,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3090],"tags":[12332,51,5286,1700,207810,207812,57390,6218,34916,3749,12,75066,207809,21058,15401,1271,6384,1219,16,15,207811],"class_list":{"0":"post-687428","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-budget-deficit","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-economic-growth","11":"tag-economy","12":"tag-elderly-residents","13":"tag-financial-market-performance","14":"tag-financial-secretary-paul-chan-mo-po","15":"tag-geopolitics","16":"tag-greater-bay-area","17":"tag-hong-kong","18":"tag-news","19":"tag-northern-metropolis","20":"tag-public-forum","21":"tag-scmp","22":"tag-social-welfare","23":"tag-stamp-duty","24":"tag-stock-exchange","25":"tag-trade-war","26":"tag-uk","27":"tag-united-kingdom","28":"tag-user-pays"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115872619766517732","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/687428","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=687428"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/687428\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/687429"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=687428"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=687428"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=687428"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}