The financial services sector of Hong Kong, including the banking industry, the securities and futures industry and the insurance industry, will open for business as normal tomorrow (January 3), a spokesman for the Financial Sector Emergency Co-ordination Centre (FSECC) said today (Sunday).
The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has confirmed that all authorised institutions in Hong Kong have completed wellness checks of their mission critical systems and have not identified any problem. The Hong Kong Interbank Clearing Limited (HKICL) has also successfully completed simulation tests for the interbank payment systems with member banks.
"The HKMA is satisfied from these reports that Hong Kong's banking sector has so far passed into the Year 2000 without problem," a spokesman for the HKMA said.
Meanwhile, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC), Stock Exchange of Hong Kong (SEHK), Hong Kong Futures Exchange (HKFE), and Hongkong Clearing (HKSCC) have jointly confirmed no Y2K-induced incidents in their own systems.
These organisations successfully tested the rollover capability of their major shared systems, involving their members and other participants on January 1, 2000. They have also been in contact with their registered intermediaries.
In the insurance industry, the Office of the Commissioner of Insurance (OCI) has not received any exception reports so far from the insurance companies.
"The financial services sector will open for business tomorrow. Relevant organisations will continue to monitor developments in the next two days. Given the high level of Year 2000 preparedness and the absence of any disruptions so far, we do not expect any major problem. We believe that tomorrow will pass as any normal business day," said a spokesman of the FSECC.
The FSECC will remain in operation up to the late hours of January 4 as currently planned. The Centre is set up by the Financial Services Bureau to monitor developments and to co-ordinate any necessary contingency measure during the millennium transition and other critical dates for the Y2K problem.
The FSECC has been working closely with the Y2K event management or command centres of HKMA, SFC, OCI, SEHK, HKFE, HKSCC and HKICL since 31 December 1999. These centres will continue to monitor the markets over the next two days.