(Yicai Global) Feb. 27 -- Shenzhen's gross domestic product surpassed that of Hong Kong for the first time last year, marking it as the city with largest economy in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area.

Hong Kong scored GDP of HKD2.84 trillion (USD367.2 billion) last year, up 3 percent from the year before, according to economic data the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region's the Census and Statistics Department released today, Chinese state news outlet The Paper reported.

The average exchange rate of Chinese yuan against the Hong Kong dollar last year was 1.1855, per the CSD website. Hong Kong's GDP last year was thus equivalent to about CNY2.4 trillion (USD359 billion) on that basis.

Shenzhen's GDP last year rose 7.6 percent to CNY2.42 trillion, more than that of Hong Kong, the city's economic data show, distinguishing it as the largest economic entity in the Greater Bay Area which Beijing is seeking to connect into one giant conurbation through ambitious infrastructure and other projects.

Rumblings were already on the horizon by last year that Shenzhen's GDP might have surpassed its next-door neighbor's. The special administrative region's GDP was HKD2.66 trillion in 2017, so some media claimed it came in under Shenzhen's as reckoned per the then-exchange rate.

The general calculation and comparison should be based on the average exchange rate for the year rather than for a certain day, the CSD said, adding that Hong Kong's GDP in 2017 was about CNY61 billion more than Shenzhen's based on the annual rate.
Editor: Ben Armour