Primasia Corporate Services Responds to Surge of 122,481 Hong Kong Company Registrations
Registrations are 45% higher compared to first-half 2025 figures as company register surpasses 1.6 million mark for the first time ever.
A total of 122,481 local and re-domiciled companies have been newly registered in Hong Kong during the first six months of 2026, according to statistics revealed by the Companies Registry on 16 July 2026, up 45.3% from the 84,293 registered companies in the corresponding period of 2025, and already 63% of the full-year record last year, which amounted to 195,343 new registrations.
According to Companies Registry’s first-half report, the total number of local and re-domiciled companies registered has exceeded 1.6 million mark to reach 1,609,720 at 30 June 2026, an all-time high and an increase of 52,617 companies since the end of 2025, when the number on the register was 1,557,103.
The first half saw a continued growth in Hong Kong’s re-domiciliation regime, which enables companies that are incorporated abroad to switch their place of incorporation to Hong Kong through a process that does not require a court-sanctioned scheme. The Companies Registry recorded 70 re-domiciliation applications and 42 completed re-domiciliations at the end of June 2026, against only six cases completed at the end of 2025, when the regime was in operation for less than eight months. So far, there have been two insurance companies and one listed company amongst completed re-domiciliations.
Hong Kong also saw a further growth in the number of foreign companies setting up their offices in Hong Kong: 903 new foreign companies were registered in the first half of 2026, bringing the total number of foreign companies on the register to 16,014.
“What we see in first-half numbers is not only the volume, but the broadness,” John Barclay, Managing Director of Primasia Corporate Services Limited. “We see new incorporations from entrepreneurs that relocate themselves to Hong Kong, from companies who add a Hong Kong holding level, and now a steady flow of re-domiciliations that barely existed as a separate category two years ago. What becomes a bottleneck for most new companies is no longer the incorporation process, that now happens fast enough, but opening a bank account after it.”
Hong Kong’s incorporation process – filing form NNC1 (or NNC1G if the company is not limited by shares) with the Companies Registry, as well as filing the Business Registration with the Inland Revenue Department – is one of the quickest in Asia. Newly incorporated companies have a number of obligatory steps to take: appointing a company secretary, maintaining a Significant Controllers Register, as well as filing an annual return (form NAR1) within 42 days after incorporation.
About Primasia Corporate Services Limited
Primasia Corporate Services Limited is a Hong Kong corporate service provider offering company incorporation, company secretarial services, accounting and tax, payroll, trust and fund administration services. The company holds Trust or Company Service Provider license TC000446 and operates in Hong Kong for more than 20 years, having offices in Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou.
Media inquiries:
Primasia Corporate Services Limited
Suite 1901-04, 19/F, Tai Yau Building,
181 Johnston Road,
Wan Chai, Hong Kong Island,
Hong Kong
Web: https://primasia.hk/
Telephone: +852 2882 2088
Email: [email protected]
Press Release Contact: John Barclay, Chairman