Hong Kong: Economic growth rises in the fourth quarter of 2025
GDP reading: Hong Kong’s GDP grew 3.8% in annual terms in Q4, following a 3.7% expansion in the previous quarter. Q4’s reading was the strongest since Q4 2023. In seasonally adjusted quarter-on-quarter terms, the economy expanded 1.0% in Q4, following 0.9% growth in the prior quarter.
Broad-based expansion: Compared to the previous period’s data, readings in Q4 improved for private consumption (+2.5% in annual terms vs +2.4% in Q3), fixed investment (+10.9% vs +3.4% in Q3), exports of goods (+15.5% vs +12.0% in Q3), imports of goods (+18.4% vs +11.7%) and imports of services (+3.1% vs +2.3% in Q3). In contrast, readings worsened for government consumption (+1.4% vs +2.0% in Q3) and exports of services (+4.9% vs +6.6% in Q3).
Key underlying drivers behind the solid economic performance were higher visitor arrivals, strong global demand for electronics exports, strong financial services activity, lower interest rates than in 2024 and a stabilizing property market.
Panelist insight: On the data and outlook, Nomura analysts said:
“For full-year 2025, GDP growth reached 3.5% – the fastest rate of annual expansion since 2021. Excluding the volatile Covid years, this marks the strongest economic growth since 2017. Given these latest outturns, we raise our 2026 GDP growth forecast to 3.3% from 2.7%. We expect GDP growth to slow only modestly to 3.6% y-o-y in Q1.”