Chinese tourism boom for Hong Kong.

• Position: Hong Kong

Zhao Yuexin, visiting Hong Kong from northeastern China's Liaoning province, bought two bags stuffed with Elizabeth Arden and Shiseido skin care products at Sa Sa International Holdings' Causeway Bay outlet.

"What I am contributing to the city isn't small," said Zhao, 40, double-checking her HK$3600 ($678) bill, which is a third of the average urban worker's annual salary in China.

Visitors from China are the biggest spenders in Hong Kong, helping spur the economy and stoke a rally in stocks, Sa Sa, which doubled this quarter, and other retailers' shares may gain further as easier border and currency controls allow the nouveau fiche to splurge more often in the city.

"Chinese visitors are spending a lot of money," said Bich Pham, a managing director at TAL CEF Global Asset Management Ltd. "Those retail stocks have shot up substantially. We still believe there is some upside."

Hong Kong's handover to Chinese sovereignty in 1997 didn't throw open the city to tourists from China, who could only visit the so-called Special Administrative Region on...