University students wearing Guy Fawkes masks march before their graduation ceremony at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University on November 5 2019. Picture: GETTY IMAGES/BILLY HC KWOK
The far-reaching effects of the protests speaks to the outsize role that Hong Kong has hitherto played as a thoroughfare for Chinese shoppers. Buyers have flocked to the city for its zero consumption tax and variety of global imports, whether luxury handbags or infant formula. Hong Kong’s business outlook continued to drop in October, with the purchasing manager’s index for the whole economy falling to 39.3, according to IHS Markit. The reading was the lowest since the depths of the financial crisis in November 2008.
The protests in Hong Kong “impacted traffic and caused some of our stores to close temporarily,” Harmit J Singh, CFO of denim company Levi Strauss, told analysts. Crocs, a maker of rubber-like shoes, said its stores in the city were “significantly impacted by everything that’s going on there”, Andrew Rees, the company’s president and CEO, said.