Haldanes contributed to World Bank’s Business Ready 2025 Report – Market Competition section
World Bank’s Business Ready 2025 Report
In December 2025, the World Bank released its flagship report, “Business Ready (B-READY) 2025” (the “Report”). Our Head of Antitrust and Competition Law practice, Felix Ng, alongside Associates Florence Yan, Joanne Lam, and Brian Fung, have been selected as expert contributors for Hong Kong to the Market Competition section. Full report can be downloaded here.
The Report is the World Bank Group’s corporate flagship report that assesses business and investment climate worldwide. This 2025 edition encompasses assessments of 101 economies and is part of a three-year project launched in 2024. Through the three pillars of “Regulatory Framework”, “Public Services” and “Operational Efficiency”, the Report seeks to analyse how business environments can be more supportive and sustainable for the purpose of stimulating economic development and job markets globally.
Market Competition section
Under the aforesaid three pillars, 10 topics are covered in the World Bank’s Report, representing an enterprise’s life cycle: Business Entry, Location, Utilities, Labour, Finance, Trade, Market Competition, Taxation, Dispute Resolution and Insolvency.
We have shared our antitrust and competition law experience with the World Bank to facilitate its analysis of the market competition environment in Hong Kong, particularly on the following aspects:
- Antitrust & Competition Regulatory Landscape in Hong Kong
- Enforcement Powers of the Competition Commission
- Enforcement of Antitrust & Competition Regulations
- Merger Control Regulations
- Institutional Framework
- Exclusions and Exemptions
Major Findings
Major findings of the Report include:
- Among the three pillars, the Report ranks Hong Kong in the top 20 for “Operational Efficiency” and in the second quintile for “Regulatory Framework” and “Public Services”.
- The World Bank highlighted three main messages for 2025 (see p.9-13 of the Report):
- Economies facing the most critical need to create more and better jobs are the least business ready.
- Economies find it harder to provide public services that support businesses than to enact laws and rules to regulate them—resulting in a persistent “public services gap.”
- The ease of regulatory compliance and effective use of public services by firms are critical for growth, yet they lag behind regulatory strength—resulting in an “efficiency gap.”
Haldanes’ Antitrust & Competition Practice
Deeply rooted in Hong Kong for five decades, Haldanes stands among the pioneering law firms with significant experience in Antitrust & Competition Law. We frequently represent corporate and individual clients in a broad spectrum of Competition Commission investigations and Competition Tribunal proceedings, while providing compliance advice and corporate training to assist clients in navigating the competition regulatory framework.
Our recent global recognitions for Antitrust & Competition Law practice include:
- Regulatory Law Firm of the Year (Finalist) – ALB Pan Asian Regulatory Awards 2025, Singapore
- Felix Ng, Regulatory Lawyer of the Year (Finalist) – ALB Pan Asian Regulatory Awards 2025, Singapore
- Leading Independent Hong Kong Law Firm with “notable strength” in Antitrust & Competition Practice – Legal 500
- Competition & Antitrust Firm of the Year 2025, China Business Law Journal.
- Felix Ng is recommended in Lexology (formerly Who’s Who Legal) – Competition 2025
- Authors of the In-Depth guide: Cartels and Leniency (formerly The Cartels and Leniency Review), Lexology since 2021 (for the 2025 article, click here).
- Winners of Antitrust and Competition Law in Mondaq’s Thought Leadership Awards in 2023 and 2024, Mondaq (for the 2024 article, click here).
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