How to Start a Consulting Business in Hong Kong (2026 Guide)

A Hong Kong consulting company can be set up in a day. Most of the decisions that affect you later are made before you file anything.

Two of them matter more than the rest. The first is whether your advice is regulated: a management or marketing consultant can start straight away, while someone advising clients on which shares to buy needs a licence from the Securities and Futures Commission before taking a single client. The second is where you'll do the work, because that decides where your fees are taxed.

This guide takes you through each step in order, with the government fees and rules that apply in 2026. If you're comparing structures first, our guide to setting up a private limited company goes into more detail on requirements.

Step 1: Check Whether Your Advice Is Regulated

Hong Kong has no general licence for consultants. Business registration with the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) is required for every business, but it isn't a licence to carry out a regulated activity.

A few kinds of advice are regulated:

The SFC's Licensing Handbook sets out each regulated activity and the capital a licensed firm must hold. If you're unsure whether your service is covered, search the government's Business Licence Information Service, which lists the licences and permits that apply to different business activities.

Step 2: Choose Your Business Structure

Most consultants choose between a sole proprietorship and a private limited company.

A sole proprietorship is cheaper to run and suits a consultant testing demand in Hong Kong, but it isn’t an option if your advice needs an SFC licence, because the SFC only licenses corporations to carry on a regulated business and doesn’t accept sole proprietorships or partnerships. A limited company protects your personal assets if a client claims for a mistake, and many corporate clients prefer to sign with a company. If you’re going into business with others, see our guide to partnership structures in Hong Kong, which explains why a company is usually the better option.

Step 3: Register Your Company

A private limited company needs at least one director, who must be an individual, and at least one shareholder, who can be the same person. It also needs a company secretary and a registered office address in Hong Kong.

The company secretary must be either an individual who ordinarily lives in Hong Kong or a company with its registered office or a place of business there. If you're the only director, you can't also be the secretary, so most solo consultants appoint a licensed corporate service provider.

Government fees for applications made from 1 April 2026 are:

According to the Companies Registry, certificates for a private company filed electronically are normally issued within one hour. Preparing documents and completing a provider's checks add a few working days.

You'll receive a Certificate of Incorporation and a Business Registration Certificate at the same time.

Step 4: Understand How Your Consulting Fees Are Taxed

Hong Kong taxes profits that arise in or are derived from Hong Kong. For service businesses, the IRD's view is that service fees are generally sourced where the services that earn them are performed. Its practice note on the locality of profits (DIPN 21) sets out this approach, and Board of Review decisions have applied it to service income.

What that means in practice:

• If you live in Hong Kong and do the work there, expect your fees to be taxed in Hong Kong, at 8.25% on the first HKD 2 million of a company's assessable profits and 16.5% above that.
• If you live abroad and do all the work outside Hong Kong, your company may be able to claim the profits are offshore. The claim is made in the profits tax return, and the IRD will ask for evidence of where the work was done.

Keep that evidence from the first engagement: your contracts, and records of where you worked, such as timesheets or travel records. Our guide to offshore tax exemption covers what the IRD usually asks for. Remember that the country you live in may also tax the income.

Hong Kong has no VAT or GST, so you don't add a consumption tax to your invoices.

Step 5: Set Up How Clients Pay You

Consultants with international clients often invoice in USD or EUR. A business account that holds those currencies lets you keep fees in the currency they arrive in and convert only when you need to.

Statrys is licensed as a Money Service Operator in Hong Kong and opens multi-currency business accounts for companies registered in Hong Kong, Singapore and the British Virgin Islands. Statrys isn't a bank. For a consulting business, these features are the ones that matter:

• Receive payments in 11 currencies, and send in 18
• Local currency account details in the UK, Germany, Luxembourg, Denmark, Liechtenstein and Australia, so clients there can pay you like a local supplier
• FX fees from 0.1% on major currencies
• Free invoicing software that supports multiple currencies and recurring invoices

Statrys doesn't charge a monthly fee. 96% of clients opened their accounts within 3 business days.

Step 6: Hire Staff and Check Your Right to Work in Hong Kong

If you hire employees in Hong Kong, you must enrol eligible staff aged 18 to 64 in a Mandatory Provident Fund (MPF) scheme within the first 60 days of employment, according to the MPF Schemes Authority. Our guide to payroll in Hong Kong covers the rest of an employer's obligations.

Owning a Hong Kong company doesn't give you the right to work in Hong Kong. If you plan to move there and run the business in person, you'll need a visa, usually under the entrepreneur route of the General Employment Policy. Our overview of Hong Kong immigration policies compares the routes.

Step 7: Keep Up With Yearly Filings

Once your company is running, it has a fixed set of yearly obligations:

Keep your business records for at least seven years, as the IRD requires.

How Statrys Can Help

Statrys sets up Hong Kong companies online, with a company secretary and registered address included, and keeps the annual filings up to date. You can also open a multi-currency business account to receive client payments, and use our accounting services for bookkeeping and year-end accounts.

To get started, see our Hong Kong company registration service.