Investors in south China's Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area now have greater access to a wider range of each other's financial products, thanks to the implementation of the upgraded Cross-boundary Wealth Management Connect (WMC) pilot scheme starting Wednesday.
The Cross-boundary WMC is a two-way scheme, allowing eligible Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Macao residents in the Greater Bay Area to invest in eligible wealth management products offered by financial institutions in each other's market. It aims at facilitating cross-boundary investment by individual residents in the area and promotes the opening-up of the Chinese mainland's financial markets as well as the mutual social and economic development of the mainland, Hong Kong and Macao.
Previously, the Cross-boundary WMC 1.0 pilot scheme only allowed investors to purchase financial products through commercial banks.
Now, the updated pilot scheme enables investors to purchase financial products also from securities companies. A total of 14 securities companies have been approved in the first batch to offer these products, including some higher-risk fund options.
"The Cross-boundary WMC 2.0 pilot scheme has to some extent lowered the entry threshold for 'southbound investors", who are mainland investors in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area. At the same time, it has raised the investment quota for individual investors to 3 million yuan (about 412,000 U.S. dollars) per capita and expanded the range and types of eligible financial products. These upgrades will better meet the cross-boundary investment needs of Greater Bay Area residents, enhance financial market connectivity within the region, and support the country's high-level financial opening-up," said Wang Kai, chief strategist at Guosen Securities.
The financial scheme provides more wealth management product choices for residents in the Greater Bay Area, thereby promoting the cross-boundary flow and use of the Chinese yuan.
Recent official data showed that, by the end of October 2024, more than 120,000 individual investors in the Greater Bay Area had joined the Cross-boundary WMC pilot scheme, including more than 50,000 from Hong Kong and Macao and over 70,000 from the Chinese mainland. Mainland banks have processed cross-border fund transfers totaling over 95 billion yuan (about 13 billion U.S. dollars) through compliant management methods.
The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area encompasses the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao as well as nine cities in the neighboring Guangdong Province.
China aims to build the bay area into a role model of high-quality development, an international first-class bay area and a world-class city cluster, as a key development strategy in the country's reform and opening up.
Improved pilot scheme implemented to facilitate cross-boundary financial services in south China's Greater Bay Area
