Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that a total of 992 new companies were incorporated in the third quarter of 2012, up by 16.7% year-on-year; total value of registered capital decreased by 66.1% to MOP162 million, attributable to a plunge of 95.2% in that of Business Services. The majority of new incorporations were operating in Wholesale and Retail (340), Business Services (204) and Real Estate (154).

Analyzed by size of registered capital, there were 678 new incorporations (68.3% of total) registered with capital under MOP50,000 and the total value of capital amounted to MOP18 million only; however, there were 28 new companies registered with capital of MOP1,000,000 or over, and the total value of capital reached MOP105 million (64.8% of total), indicating the predominance of new incorporations with small capital.

Analysed by place of residence of the shareholders, capital of the new companies came mainly from Macao (MOP76 million), which was followed by Mainland China (MOP70 million), including MOP62 million from the 9 Provinces of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region; and Hong Kong (MOP12 million). Besides, there were 616 new companies established solely by Macao shareholders, 123 joint ventures between Macao shareholders and other countries or regions.

In the third quarter of 2012, companies in dissolution totalled 121 and the value of registered capital amounted to MOP12 million, of which 45 were previously operating in Wholesale and Retail.

In the first three quarters of 2012, a total of 2,822 new companies were incorporated, up by 11.6% year-on-year; total value of registered capital decreased by 48.8% to MOP450 million. Companies in dissolution totalled 382 and the value of registered capital amounted to MOP64 million. At the end of the third quarter of 2012, number of registered companies totalled 39,116, an increase of 3,171 from a year earlier.