Monday 5th February 2024

Dear Reader,

Hello again. Belated happy Gregorian New Year, and happy Year of the Dragon on Saturday.

A few new articles justify a newsletter, I think. Although I have mostly been pre-occupied with the on-going cancer battle, I have found time to add some new datasets to the Webb-site database, including HK vehicle registrations and traffic data and Land Registry transactions data, where you can see the collapse in transaction volume since 2011 caused by the so-called "cooling measures". I've also updated the HKSAR Accounts Explorer to 31-Mar-2023, so dig in there if you are writing coverage of the forthcoming HK budget, one aspect of which we cover below.

NEW ARTICLES
HK's Rates reforms: damage to property values, needless complexity and misdirected handouts
It's not too late for the Government to return to fiscal sanity with a simple Rates system rather than practice the populist politics of petty envy. (30-Jan-2024).
Note: We have submitted this article to the Legislative Council Panel on Financial Affairs and to the HK Government.

Breaking: HK Government withholds Task Force report, citing threat to financial markets stability
We asked for the report. They refused. Now we're really wondering what's in it. (29-Jan-2024)

Hong Kong Island, major vehicle exporter?
Transport Department data suggest that HK Island exported a net 1.25m vehicles in 2022, more than are on the roads in the SAR, and the Island is on track to beat that in 2023. Take a look at the data and tell us why! (9-Dec-2023)

And much more besides...
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David M. Webb
Editor, Webb-site.com