Hong Kong unrest contributed 2 pct points to Q3 GDP contraction-official

HONG KONG (Reuters) – Social unrest in Hong Kong contributed two percentage points to the city’s economic contraction in the third quarter, Paul Chan, financial secretary of the city’s government, told legislators in a televised hearing on Friday, citing “rough estimates”.

Hong Kong sank into recession for the first time in a decade in the third quarter, government data confirmed in November, weighed down by increasingly violent anti-government protests and the escalating U.S.-China trade war.

The economy shrank by 3.2% in July-September from the previous quarter on a seasonally adjusted basis and contracted 2.9% from the previous year, revised government data showed.

Reporting by Noah Sin; Editing by Muralikumar Anantharaman