The total number of local companies registered in Hong Kong stood at 1,460,494 at the end of 2024, with 145,053 having been newly registered during the year, the Companies Registry announced today.

In 2024, altogether 1,079 non-Hong Kong companies registered a newly established place of business in Hong Kong under the Companies Ordinance.

The total number of registered non-Hong Kong companies reached 15,126 by the end of 2024, up 2% year-on-year.

As for the licensing of trust or company service providers under the Anti-Money Laundering & Counter-Terrorist Financing Ordinance, a total of 798 licences were granted, taking the number of licensees to 6,817 by the end of 2024.

The number of charges paid for registration of properties of companies was 12,137, while the number of notifications of payments and releases was 18,201. There were also 3,139,906 documents delivered to the registry for registration.

Meanwhile, 5,194,865 electronic searches of document image records were conducted.

There were also 292 limited partnership funds newly registered in 2024, bringing the total number to 997 by the end of the year.

For open-ended fund companies, 231 such companies were newly incorporated in 2024, bringing the total number to 472 by the end of the year.

During 2024, the Government took forward two legislative amendment exercises to enhance the Companies Ordinance.

The first exercise aims at enabling listed companies incorporated in Hong Kong to hold shares bought back in the treasury and dispose of them, and promoting paperless corporate communication for both listed and unlisted Hong Kong companies.

The second exercise deals with introducing a company re-domiciliation regime to enable non-Hong Kong-incorporated companies to re-domicile to Hong Kong while maintaining their legal identities as a body corporate and ensuring business continuity without the need to go through complicated and costly judicial procedures.