To leverage the share price gains, Halbis, a separate investment unit of HSBC Global Asset Management, has sold stocks in Hong Kong-listed Chinese developers and banks – reported Bloomberg. Halbis believes that companies in Hong Kong will gain from the China economic growth besides the asset inflation sparked by lax monetary policies prevailing worldwide.
Halbis, which holds $140 billion of global assets, is mainly pinning its hopes on Hong Kong traded China-related stocks as the economy has emerged from a year long recession, reported the newspaper. It expects them to grow about 14 times in 2010, against 18 times for companies focused on domestic economy. It also estimates China firms to grow 25%, as compared to 18% growth of Hong Kong-focused firms.
In an interview to the newspaper, Ayaz Ebrahim, chief executive officer of Asia Pacific at Halbis, said: I’m looking at from where stocks were earlier in the year to today, and we’ve seen big spikes up. So we’ve taken a bit of profit here and there. But if you are looking at a 12-to-18-month view, you’ve still got to remain positive. Hong Kong-listed consumer discretionary stocks, industrial and manufacturing shares related to China will also benefit from the nation’s stimulus policies.
Individual balance sheet strength in Asia, especially in Hong Kong, is very strong. There’s a lot of money just sitting in bank accounts, and we may see some of that money coming back out into assets, equities, possibly property, as confidence gradually returns, he added.
