Huatai Securities targets overseas Chinese retail traders in latest global expansion

Huatai Securities, China’s fourth-largest brokerage in terms of profit, has launched a US stock trading mobile app targeting millions of Chinese retail traders living overseas.

By launching Zhangle Global, it is also responding to a changing revenue model. As customers demand more in-depth trade data, analytics and access to international markets, the traditional commission-based model is being replaced with one based on membership, said Zhu Yali, the brokerage’s head of financial technology and retail business based in Hong Kong.

Huatai Financial Holdings, the company’s Hong Kong-based unit, recently won approval from the city’s securities regulator to start remotely enlisting overseas clients using technology such as biometric verification.

Huatai Securities sees Hong Kong as a launch pad for its global ambitions. There were about 48.7 million Chinese living outside China, as of the end of 2018, according to Statista.

“The retail business is where Chinese brokerages can make a difference, as we have more experience in using fintech than Wall Street brokerages. Retail brokerage is the one spot where we could potentially beat Wall Street investment banks, which are traditionally stronger in their institutional businesses,” said Zhu, who previously worked for Goldman Sachs in Hong Kong and Japan for over a decade.