Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that a total of 988 new companies were incorporated in the first quarter of 2013, up by 107 year-on-year; total value of registered capital decreased by 22.4% to MOP154 million, with that of Wholesale and Retail (MOP52 million) falling by 16.2%. The majority of new incorporations were operating in Wholesale and Retail (401), Business Services (184) and Construction (127).

Analysed by size of registered capital, there were 701 new incorporations (71.0% of total) registered with capital under MOP50,000 and the total value of capital amounted to MOP18 million; however, there were 33 new companies registered with capital of MOP1,000,000 or over, and the total value of capital reached MOP98 million (63.8% of total), indicating the predominance of new incorporations with small capital.

Analysed by place of residence of the shareholders, in the first quarter of 2013, capital of the new companies came mainly from Macao (MOP70 million), which was followed by Mainland China (MOP36 million), including MOP19 million from the 9 Provinces of the Pan-Pearl River Delta Region; capital of those from Portugal amounted to MOP25 million. Analysed by combination of the shareholders, there were 645 new companies established solely by Macao shareholders, and 146 joint ventures between shareholders from Macao and other countries or regions.

In the first quarter of 2013, companies in dissolution totalled 129, similar to the same quarter of 2012, of which 56 were previously operating in Wholesale and Retail. The value of registered capital of companies in dissolution amounted to MOP188 million, up by almost 5 times year-on-year.

At the end of the first quarter of 2013, number of registered companies totalled 40,647, an increase of 3,220 from a year earlier.