Hong Kong’s Total Retail Sales Up 18.4 Pct In May

HONG KONG, July 4 (Xinhua) — The value of Hong Kong’s total retail sales in May, provisionally estimated at 34.5 billion HK dollars (about 4.4 billion U.S. dollars), increased by 18.4 percent year on year, showed the latest data released by the Census and Statistics Department of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) government Monday.

   A spokesman for the HKSAR government said that the value of total retail sales continued to increase visibly in May over a year earlier thanks to the revival of inbound tourism and positive consumption sentiment.

   The revised estimate of the value of total retail sales in April increased by 14.9 percent compared with a year earlier.

   For the first 5 months of 2023 taken together, it was provisionally estimated that the value of total retail sales increased by 21 percent compared with the same period last year, the data showed.