“Many companies are actively pursuing plans to list in Hong Kong. The string of national policies benefiting Hong Kong is expected to play a supporting role in different economic sectors when they are rolled out successively.”

Chan added that the value of the city’s merchandise exports had recorded double-digit year-on-year growth for three consecutive months, with an overall increase of 12.5 per cent in the second quarter.

In the first quarter, the city’s gross domestic product (GDP) expanded 2.7 per cent compared with the same period last year, at the lower end of the government’s forecast. On a full-year basis, the GDP is expected to climb anywhere between 2.5 and 3.5 per cent against last year.

But a government spokesman earlier said the city faced challenges from weak spending as Hongkongers were heading north to spend while inbound mainland Chinese tourists refrained from spending big.

The government is due to reveal the advanced estimate of the second quarter GDP figure on Tuesday.

Chan also pointed to the visit he led with key financial and regulatory officials to the country’s capital last week, where they met leaders of different ministries and commissions, including Xia Baolong, Beijing’s point man on Hong Kong affairs, and Li Yunze, director of the National Administration of Financial Regulation.

Xia said Hong Kong was facing profound shifts in its internal and external environments and called on the city’s leadership to recognise and respond to those changes to “achieve better development through reform”.

The director of the State Council’s Hong Kong and Macau Affairs Office also urged all sectors to be proactive and singularly focused on doing whatever it took to ensure the financial hub’s “golden brand” continued to shine.

Chan said in his Sunday blog the city had to embrace and understand changes.

“We need to grasp the direction of the country’s future policy development and understand its thinking so as to ensure Hong Kong can take advantage of the country’s development momentum,” he said.

“We must make good use of Hong Kong’s status as an international financial, shipping and trade centre to help direct funds projects that can accelerate the cultivation of new productive forces through goal-oriented policies and an efficient market and attract hi-tech and leading talent from all over the world.”