New | Survey shows Shanghai-Hong stock connect not yet popular with international investors
Global fund houses show interest in using HK-Shanghai stock connect scheme in the near future after legal and technical issues hold them back
Only three in 10 of the biggest fund houses in the city have traded mainland equities via the stock through-train scheme launched in November, indicating the programme that links the markets of Hong Kong and Shanghai is not yet popular with international institutional investors.
The rest of the respondents say they want to invest but are held back by regulatory and technical issues plaguing the plan, according to a survey by the Hong Kong Investment Funds Association.
"At this stage, the key focus is how to resolve the legal and technical impediments [of the scheme]," said Bruno Lee, the association's chairman, on how to attract more international investors to the scheme.
The survey, the first of its kind that tracked 41 of the biggest fund houses that manage US$20 trillion globally, showed international big players were in no rush to use the scheme to invest in the mainland.
The scheme, which began on November 17, allows cross-border trading up to a quota of 550 billion yuan (HK$693.4 billion), while international investors can trade up to 13 billion yuan a day in Shanghai-listed A shares through Hong Kong.
So far, only 13 fund houses, or 31 per cent of the respondents, have used the scheme over the past two months.