香港地产股还未见底 Hong Kong property piling up

Hong Kong is not known for being cheap — except, perhaps, for plastic toys in the 1980s. At the opposite end of the spectrum sits Hong Kong property. Shoebox dwellings of 170 sq ft can cost up to $400,000.

香港并不以廉价著称——或许上世纪80年代的塑料玩具除外。位于价格顶端是香港的房地产。170平方英尺的蜗居，价格可能高达40万美元。

With those sums in mind, Hong Kong property stocks might look oversold. After falling 30 per cent since last June, Barclays says shares in developers including Henderson Land and Sun Hung Kai Properties anticipate property Price declines of up to one quarter.

考虑到这样的价位，香港的地产股看起来可能处于超卖的状态。巴克莱(Barclays)表示，自去年6月以来，恒基兆业地产(Henderson Land)和新鸿基地产(Sun Hung Kai Properties)等地产开发商的股价下跌了30%，这预示着香港房地产价格将下降高达四分之一。

That may sound extreme. Prices are down a mere 4 per cent from peaks. But the fall in share prices makes sense all the same. After five years of rises since 2009, property prices are showing signs of softening, with the Centa-City Leading Index dropping for four consecutive weeks.

这听起来或许有些极端。目前房价相比顶峰仅下降4%。尽管如此，股价的下跌依然合乎情理。香港房价在2009年之后的5年都在上涨，现在表现出疲软的迹象，中原城市领先指数(Centa-City Leading Index)已连续4周下降。

Transactions, an indicator of confidence in current pricing, have also slowed. October residential unit sales were the lowest in 19 months, according to the Land Registry.

衡量市场对当前定价的信心的指标——房产成交量——也放缓了。根据香港土地注册处(Land Registry)的统计，10月份的住宅成交量是19个月以来最低的。

A greater threat, though, comes from US interest rates. With the Hong Kong currency pegged to the US dollar, any rise in US rates exports a similar increase to the Chinese territory. For high-end property, the difference between mortgage rates and rental yields is already low, at 35 basis points, according to real estate agent Savills. A 25bp rise, along with falling rents, could lead to more secondary supply hitting the market as mortgage financing becomes onerous.

然而，更大的威胁来自于美国利率。由于港元盯住美元，美国利率的任何上升都会导致香港的利率出现类似的上升。根据地产机构第一太平戴维斯(Savills)的数字，对于高端房地产而言，房贷利率和租金收益率之间的差值已经很低，为35个基点。如果利率提高25个基点，加上租金下降，供房贷的负担会变得沉重，这可能导致更多二手房地产供应冲击市场。

For Hong Kong developers, this does not look like a worry yet. In the 12 months to June, Sun Hung Kai reported margins of 40 per cent on residential property sales in Hong Kong. Analysts note, however, that recent primary launches indicate price declines of between a tenth and a fifth as developers try to offload inventory ahead of rate rises. In the long run, too, the government is keen to encourage more supply to keep prices down.

对香港房地产开发商而言，这看起来还不像是一件需要担心的事情。新鸿基报告称，在截至6月的12个月里，其在香港的住宅地产销售的利润率为40%。然而，分析人士指出，随着开发商试图在利率上升前去库存，最近的新房发售显示房地产价格的跌幅为十分之一到五分之一之间。长期来看也是如此，政府热衷于鼓励增加房地产供给，以平抑房地产价格。

Property stocks in Hong Kong look cheap and can get cheaper still.

香港的地产股看起来很便宜，而且还可能变得更便宜。