Hong Kong’s forthcoming ‘roaring twenties’!

This column has been previously published in Hong Kong Echo, the French Chamber of commerce in Hong Kong

I got this little soft toy when I toured the headquarters of Tencent in Shenzhen. When I talk about getting 20 years younger, well, this was the first step.

It’s all the ICC’s fault! In 2011, I took a round-the-world trip throughout the year to see where I would settle next. My objective: to understand the emergence of the so-called New World after the Great Financial Crisis of 2008. When I arrived in Hong Kong, my first encounter was with IFC One (forty floors), IFC Two (eighty floors), and then the ICC (one hundred and twenty floors).

I realised that its construction was given the green light in 2008, at a time when the rest of the world, myself included, was panicking about whether any investment bank would survive the coming weekend. I understood that the same crazy pioneering spirit which had built the US in the 20th century – stretching the elastic band until it breaks – would now be prevailing in China in the 21st century. And Hong Kong would be the best place for a Westerner like me to observe this New World emerging.

So, I set down my two pieces of luggage in this unfamiliar place. To my surprise, I got 20 years younger as a result.

First, I became 20 years younger in my surroundings. As an investor I had spent 15 years in London observing the behaviour of old, wealthy Europeans who have the great advantage of changing very little. In Hong Kong though, I had to turn my attention to millennials and Generation Z as they were the ones spending the savings of the two preceding generations. 

Then, I became 20 years younger in my mind. No other place in the world offers the mental benefits of the seaside being located only 30 minutes away from a major Goldman Sachs office. The south side of Hong Kong Island, where I live, never fails to rejuvenate my mind every evening while I listen to the sound of the waves on the shore

So, I set down my two pieces of luggage in this unfamiliar place. To my surprise, I got 20 years younger as a result.

Finally, I became 20 years younger in my projects. While investing in Europe involved mainly questions around the sustainability of existing oligopolies, investing in China requires you to assess the soundness of new disruptive business models. Much of this precisely requires you to take a 20-year view on the future, something which Europe has largely given up on.

But aren’t these observations more relevant to the future of mainland China than of Hong Kong? Isn’t Hong Kong just becoming a land of no future for its youth given its real estate bubble? And isn’t it doomed to become only a mixture of Monaco – with its rich retirees – and of Mayfair – with its global investment bankers?

My own personal bet is that Hong Kong will continue to strive in the next 20 years and so will its youth if it knows how to seize new forthcoming opportunities. These are now more likely to involve the Greater Bay Area, which I see emerging as the new California of the 21st century. Few projects seem to me more exciting in the world than being part of building the equivalent of Germany over the next ten years: 80 million people generating US$50,000 of GDP per head. 

My dream would be to become a sort of ‘anti-border guard’, proving that both Hong Kong and Europe have never needed the mainland so much. But likewise, that the mainland has never needed Hong Kong and Europe so much either. If only I could really be 20 years old to take part in what I see as Hong Kong’s forthcoming ‘roaring twenties’!