This Drugstore Is a $3 Billion Headache

Take Hong Kong protests, add a dash of Brexit and then stir in the death of brick-and-mortar shopping. It’s hardly surprising that a savvy investor would want to bail from its stake in A.S. Watson Group, a retailer based in the former British colony with a big U.K. footprint.

These latest geopolitical flash points have been cited for Temasek Holdings Pte’s decision to table the sale of its $3 billion interest in A.S. Watson, Bloomberg reporters Manuel Baigorri, Joyce Koh and Vinicy Chan wrote Wednesday. The company has a sprawling operation in Hong Kong that includes the ubiquitous Watsons drugstore chain, supermarkets and electronics stores. Pro-democracy protests in the city, which have choked main commercial areas over the past several weekends, have become a problem. The city’s retail sales could plunge to a decade low in August, after an 11.4% drop in July, Bloomberg Intelligence says. Tourist arrivals in July fell 4.8% from a year earlier, the Immigration Department said.