BEIJING, February 15 (TMTPOST)— Shares of two online brokers popular for offering mainland Chinese investors access to overseas trades jumped as worries about tightening regulation eased.

Source: Visual China

The U.S.-listed shares of UP Fintech Holdings Ltd., an operator of Tiger Brokers, and Futu Holdings, a Tencent-backed broker, settle 6.2% and 4.8% higher respectively on Wednesday. Both of brokers closed at their highest since February 6.

Earlier that day, the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) clarified the crackdown on illegal cross-border securities businesses won’t affect existing customers. The rectification on these illegal practices has been carried out on the principle of “effectively curbing business expansion and orderly unwinding existing business”, a spokesperson of the securities regulator said at a press.

The core requirement is to prohibit offshore institutions unregistered in China from soliciting, and opening new accounts for onshore customers, at the same time, onshore investors as existing customers are still allowed to conduct transactions via these institutions, and such investors shall strictly comply with China's foreign currency management rules when new funds transferred to their offshore accounts, the spokesperson stressed.

At a statement on December, 30, 2022, CSRC asked Futu and Tiger to rectify their illegal practices and listed actions required to take, and the regulator unveiled in January the Measures for the Administration of Securities Brokerage Business, a new rule aimed to tighten up routine supervision on illegal cross-border securities brokerage business, promote rectification and standardization in a steady and orderly manner, the spokesperson introduced.

CSRC called some reports unobjective and untrue, and so far as the watchdog knows, most of securities firms involved in the abovementioned cross-border business are actively making rectification based on regulatory requirements, and have stopped open new accounts for onshore customers, according to the spokesperson. These securities firms and their overseas subsidiaries can fully and accurately understand the regulatory requirements, make rectifications in an orderly manner in accordance with laws and regulations, and will not restrict transactions from existing customers for no reason, the spokesperson added.

Last October, a report of state-owned People’s Daily pointed out that these securities brokers would face new compliance challenges in handling the personal information they collect from residents in mainland China, since the law has specified the rules for handling cross-border communication of personal data. Cross-border online brokers' operating in China is just like driving without any license, effectively conducting illegal financial activities, Sun Tianqi, the Director-General of the Financial Stability Bureau of the People's Bank of China (PBOC), warned the same month. Two months later, CSRC announced to proceed with the rectification of ongoing illegal cross-border businesses by ordering enforcement units to conducted on-site inspections and supervisions on Futu and Tiger. It determined two brokers had operated illegal cross-border securities businesses for domestic investors these years as they hadn't obtained the regulator's approval, which is against the Securities Law and relevant regulations.