Investing abroad from mainland China: FX quota and official channels

Read this first

This guide is not legal or tax advice and does not say which channel suits you. It collects what the State Administration of Foreign Exchange (SAFE), the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC), Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing (HKEX), Hong Kong’s Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) and the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) publish about how individuals in mainland China can reach foreign markets. SAFE and the CSRC write in Chinese; our explanations of their documents are translations. The pages and dates are under “Sources and references”. The People’s Bank of China (PBoC) asks automated readers not to use its website, so it is not quoted.

The annual foreign-exchange quota

SAFE’s Current Account Foreign Exchange Business Guidelines (2020 edition), issued with notice Huifa [2020] No. 14 of 28 August 2020, set the basic rule: individuals’ sales of foreign currency and domestic individuals’ purchases of foreign currency are each managed under an annual facilitation quota (便利化额度) of USD 50,000 equivalent per person per year. SAFE’s catalogue of rules in force on 30 June 2026 lists the guidelines with amendments of 2023 and 2024; we read the 2020 text, and SAFE’s Tianjin branch restated the USD 50,000 rule on 6 July 2026. The 2020 text also says:

• Within the quota, you buy or sell at a bank with your own valid identity document, at the counter or through e-banking.
• Outside the quota, a domestic individual can buy foreign currency for a current-account purpose by showing documents on that purpose that state the amount.
• Every purchase needs the Personal Foreign Exchange Purchase Application Form (个人购汇申请书), filled in truthfully, accurately and completely.
• No splitting: getting around the quota, for example by splitting purchases, can put you on SAFE’s watch list (关注名单) for the year of listing and the next two years; meanwhile every conversion needs documents that state the amount.

What the quota may not pay for

The application form on SAFE’s website (a file from April 2021) lists six things a domestic individual must not do when buying foreign currency. Item 5: the money may not be used for buying property abroad, securities investment, life insurance or investment-type insurance that pays returns or dividends, or other capital-account items “not yet open” (our translation). The others forbid false declarations and documents, lending your quota or borrowing someone else’s to split a purchase, and money laundering, gambling, tax evasion or underground banking.

• Consequences named on the form: the watch list, with no facilitation quota that year and the next two; administrative penalties; referral for an anti-money-laundering investigation; and an entry in your credit record.
• Purposes on the form: the buyer ticks one of fourteen, such as private travel, study abroad or medical treatment abroad, or “other” with a short explanation. Buying foreign securities is not on the list.

In SAFE’s wording, securities investment abroad is a capital-account item this quota does not cover.

QDII: institutions with an approved quota

The CSRC’s trial measures on Qualified Domestic Institutional Investors (QDII), Order No. 46 of 18 June 2007, describe fund management companies, securities companies and similar firms approved by the CSRC to raise money in China and invest it abroad as a portfolio, with a domestic commercial bank as custodian. A QDII fund manager may raise money by publicly offering fund units; a securities company, through collective asset management plans. The CSRC cited these measures when it approved a fund manager as a QDII on 16 September 2026.

SAFE’s foreign-exchange rules for QDIIs (SAFE Announcement 2013 No. 1, listed as in force with a 2023 amendment that postdates the text we read) also cover banks, insurers and trust companies. A QDII may invest its own money, or money raised from domestic institutions and individuals, in the overseas markets and products the rules allow.

• A quota per institution: SAFE approves each QDII’s quota, and its net outward remittances may not exceed it (Articles 4 and 6).
• Size: SAFE’s QDII table, published on 30 September 2026 with figures as of the end of September 2026, lists 196 institutions with quotas totalling USD 183.009 billion (1,830.09 亿美元): banks USD 30.99 billion, securities and fund companies USD 101 billion, insurers USD 42.003 billion and trust companies USD 9.016 billion.
• Versus Stock Connect: HKEX’s Stock Connect FAQ says QDII and similar schemes “target selected institutional investors” and that under them “quota is allocated to respective approved institution”, whereas the Stock Connect quota is available to all market participants. Stock Connect “co-exists with these schemes”.

The table names institutions, not products.

Stock Connect southbound: Hong Kong shares through a mainland broker

The SFC describes Stock Connect as allowing “qualified Mainland investors to tap the Hong Kong stock market (southbound trading)”. HKEX’s Information Book for Investors (version of 6 July 2026) adds:

• Who: “Only Mainland institutional investors and those individual investors who satisfy the eligibility criteria” are accepted; for individuals, an aggregate balance of not less than RMB 500,000 in their securities and cash accounts.
• How: through members of the Shanghai or Shenzhen stock exchanges, trading selected Hong Kong-listed stocks and ETFs in Hong Kong dollars and settling in renminbi.
• Quota: RMB 42 billion a day for each of Shanghai Connect and Shenzhen Connect, counted on net buying.
• Not northbound: since 25 July 2022, under the Shanghai and Shenzhen exchanges’ implementation measures, Mainland investors may not buy shares through northbound trading. HKEX’s definition of Mainland investors and the eligible stocks, trading days and settlement are in our Stock Connect guide.

Cross-boundary Wealth Management Connect

The HKMA says this scheme was launched in September 2021, “allowing eligible Mainland, Hong Kong and Macao residents in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area (“GBA”) to invest in wealth management products distributed by banks in each other’s market through a closed-loop funds flow channel”. In the Southbound Scheme, eligible residents of the mainland GBA cities buy products from eligible banks and securities firms in Hong Kong and Macao. Changes announced in January 2024 refined eligibility for Mainland investors, added securities firms and raised the individual quota.

The HKMA’s requirements for banks in the Southbound Scheme, issued with its circular of 24 January 2024, say:

• Who: investors must meet criteria set by the Mainland authorities (which we could not read on the PBoC’s website), verified by the Mainland partner bank, and invest in their personal capacity, “not as joint-name or corporate customers”.
• Accounts: one dedicated remittance account at a Mainland bank, paired with one dedicated investment account at a Hong Kong bank that serves only this scheme.
• Money flow: remittances between the two accounts are in renminbi through the Cross-border Interbank Payment System (CIPS); on exit, the money returns in renminbi to the paired account.
• Quotas: an aggregate quota, counted net and “initially set at RMB 150 billion”, and RMB 3 million per investor (RMB 1.5 million each if the investor uses both a bank and a licensed securities firm). When the aggregate quota is used up, Hong Kong banks cannot accept new money from the Mainland.
• Products: certain Hong Kong-domiciled, SFC-authorised funds that the bank assesses as non-complex, non-complex bonds rated low to medium risk, and deposits. Investment products listed and traded on HKEX are excluded.

Questions to ask before you move money

1. Is the payment for a current-account purpose, such as travel or study, or is it an investment?
2. Which channel does the product or account use, and do you meet its eligibility rule?
3. Which institution holds your money, who supervises it, and can a quota stop new purchases?