The total number of local companies registered was 1,391,678 at the end of 2022, while 104,120 were newly registered in the year, the Companies Registry announced today.
In 2022, 874 non-Hong Kong companies that have newly established a place of business in Hong Kong were registered under the Companies Ordinance.
The total number of registered non-Hong Kong companies reached 14,533 by the end of 2022, up 1.29% 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 533 licences were granted, resulting in 6,834 licensees in 2022.
In the year, the number of charges on properties of companies received for registration was 18,024, while the number of notifications of payments and releases was 20,185. There were also 2,768,120 documents delivered to the registry for registration.
For electronic search services, 4,668,742 searches of document image records were conducted.
There were 167 limited partnership funds newly registered in 2022, bringing the total number to 566 by the end of the year.
The Companies Registry stressed that during the year, it continued to enhance the protection of sensitive personal information while maintaining the transparency and effectiveness of the Companies Register.
As a result, phase two of the new inspection regime took effect on October 24, 2022, protecting sensitive personal information on the Index of Directors and newly delivered documents.
The last phase of the new inspection regime will commence in December 2023 whereby data subjects could apply for protecting sensitive personal information contained in documents registered with the registry.