Doing business in Singapore for clients from Hong Kong
Many Hong Kong groups and families keep a second base in Asia. Singapore is the obvious comparison: the only other common-law international financial centre in Asia, with its own regulator, courts and fund vehicles.
A second Asian base
A Hong Kong business may add Singapore to reach Southeast Asian customers, to run a fund through a variable capital company or to give a family a second home for its wealth. Founders in crypto-assets face a real choice between the two regimes, and the book explains how that choice usually turns on regulatory fit. A side-by-side view is in Hong Kong and Singapore compared.
Tax treaty and trade agreements
Singapore and Hong Kong have no comprehensive double taxation agreement. A limited agreement covers only income from ships and aircraft in international traffic, so a structure spanning both places needs its tax position worked out item by item. On trade the position is simpler: the ASEAN-Hong Kong, China Free Trade Agreement has been in force for Singapore since 11 June 2019.
Below you will find the articles written for clients from Hong Kong as they are published, followed by the sections of the book Singapore as an International Financial Centre. Your own lawyers advise you on the law of Hong Kong.
Singapore as an International Financial Centre
Singapore · Book
Singapore as an International Financial Centre — preface
Singapore · Origins
A Place on the Strait: Temasek, Singapura and the Maritime Trade of the Malay World
Singapore · Origins
The Strait of Malacca as a corridor of trade
Singapore · Origins
Temasek and Singapura in the fourteenth century: archaeology and chronicle
Singapore · Origins
Malacca, Johor and the Riau archipelago
Singapore · Origins
Portuguese, Dutch and British rivalry in the Straits
Singapore · Origins
What the pre-colonial port teaches about location and trust
Singapore · Origins
A Place on the Strait: Temasek, Singapura and the Maritime Trade of the Malay World: summary
Singapore · Origins
Raffles, the East India Company and the Free Port of 1819
Singapore · Origins
The East India Company and the China trade
Singapore · Origins
Stamford Raffles and William Farquhar
Singapore · Origins
The agreements with Sultan Hussein and the Temenggong
Singapore · Origins
The free-port principle: open to every flag
Singapore · Origins
Early growth and the first merchant community
Singapore · Origins
What 1819 means for the financial centre
Singapore · Origins
Raffles, the East India Company and the Free Port of 1819: summary
Singapore · Origins
The Treaties of 1824 and the Legal Foundations of British Singapore
Singapore · Origins
The Anglo-Dutch Treaty of 1824
Singapore · Origins
The Treaty of Friendship and Alliance of 1824
Singapore · Origins
The Straits Settlements and the Second Charter of Justice
Singapore · Origins
The reception of English law
Singapore · Origins
Land, title and the security of property
Singapore · Origins
Practical consequences for today’s practitioner
Singapore · Origins