The two largest private banks in Asia – UBS and Credit Suisse – claim to see little to no capital flight from Hong Kong, in the midst of unprecedented unrest.
«I can say to you that we’re seeing very little panic, that we’re seeing very little evidence of flight,» said John Woods, Credit Suisse’s APAC chief investment officer in a «CNBC» report. «It seems at least both depositors and businesses are not moving money in any meaningful way.»
Woods focuses on various signals such as the unwinding of Hong Kong dollar deposits as indicators of outflows but notes no such behavior being observed.
«There is a lot of talk about perhaps capital flight, but we are not seeing any sign of that,» echoed Tan Min Lan, APAC head of UBS Global Wealth Management’s chief investment office.
Elsewhere, the market is mixed about the effects to capital movements from ongoing political unrest in Hong Kong. Real estate specialists claim otherwise, stating increasing and diversified outbound Hong Kong demand for property, including the mid to low-end market and from first generation mainland Chinese immigrants.
