Deutsche Bank’s wealth management arm is shifting its headquarters to Hong Kong from Singapore to exploit the rising number of millionaires on the Chinese mainland and the liberalisation measures China is adopting.

Deutsche Bank’s wealth management arm is shifting its headquarters to Hong Kong from Singapore to exploit the rising number of millionaires on the Chinese mainland and the liberalisation measures China is adopting, a report says.

Ravi Raju, the managing director and regional head of Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management in Asia-Pacific, was quoted by the South China Morning Post as saying that the move to Hong Kong was designed to capture opportunities in the mainland and North Asia in general. Deutsche Bank later confirmed the HQ decision to WealthBriefing.

"China is implementing many reforms aimed at the internationalisation of the yuan, which is expected to become globally convertible over time," he was quoted by the publication as saying.
Today sees the start of the Shanghai-Hong Kong equity market link, or “Through Train” to directly connect share trading in the two cities; a limit on renminbi conversions for Hong Kong residents has been removed. At the same time, China is continuing to promote its renminbi-foreign investor quotas.

A mutual recognition scheme for certain funds domiciled in Hong Kong to be sold on the mainland is due to take shape; some mainland funds will be allowed to be sold in the city.

The number of high net worth individuals rose 17.8 per cent last year to reach 758,000, as reported a few weeks ago by the RBC Wealth Management/Capgemini World Wealth Report 2014.
The shift to Hong Kong comes at an interesting time as the recent pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong have led to speculation that wealth management would prefer Singapore, seen as politically perhaps more stable, to Hong Kong.

The launch today of the Hong Kong/Shanghai stock market link has seen a strong flow of money towards the Mainland, according to a report by the Financial Times (of the UK) newspaper.

It said that within five minutes of launch of the connect, international investors had bought more than RMB5bn ($817 million) in Shanghai-listed shares, and approached the halfway mark on the daily quota of RMB13 billion in about 10 minutes. Yet the southbound leg had attracted just HK$425 million ($54 million) of buying within the opening 5 minutes, it said.