HKMA beginning to swing the bat

[Chris Burford]

At 09:55 29/04/99 -0400, you wrote:
>While the HKMA is a highly competent organization, it is misleading to
call it
>a central bank.  HKMA, because of HK's currency board regime, lacks the
>monetary policy independence to perform most central bank functions.  The
>remote-controlling central bank for HK is the US Federal Reserve.
>Also, because the HKMA is hierachially subservient to the HK Finance
Secretary,
>it is very different than the relationship the politically independent
Federal
>Reserve has to the Treasury Department.  HK Financial Secretary Donald
Tsang is
>the boss of HKMA Chief Executive Joseph Yam, unlike Rubin's relationship to
>Greenspan.
>
>Henry C.K. Liu

My friend, loyal to the century old traditions of the cooperative movement,
who took such an interest in the historical relics of Hong Kong's colonial
past, has recently expressed disappointment to me that Hong Kong is
introducing some sort ot certificates of indebtedness to cover the
government funds used to purchase 13% of the stock exchange last year when
they successfully burned the raiders.

He has been praising Hong Kong for having no national debt. Now he thinks
that this step is the start of a "national debt". Does Henry or anyone else
know if there is any truth in that?

Chris Burford

London