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By Yin Lei

A number of China's leading securities dealers saw growing revenue from their stronger overseas foothold this year, the Shanghai Securities News reported on Friday.

The semi-annual financial reports of five prominent securities companies in China revealed that international operations contributed over 10 percent to their revenues in the first half of 2018. These companies intensified their efforts to venture abroad for the past few years as their foreign peers turned to the Chinese mainland.

A typical example is Haitong Securities Company Limited, which is listed at the Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSE). In its revenue for the first six months, 19 percent were generated outside the Chinese mainland, four percentage points higher year-on-year. Its overseas business revenue climbed by 9.6 percent to 2.07 billion yuan during this period.

For CITIC Securities Company Limited, also an SSE-listed player, overseas markets accounted for 13 percent of its revenue by the end of June. The Hong Kong-listed China International Capital Corporation Limited (CICC) saw its overseas revenue grow by 21 percent to 1.28 billion yuan, equivalent to 15 percent of its six-month total.

Such double-digit ratios were also seen in another two securities dealers, Huatai Securities Co., Ltd. and Everbright Securities Co., Ltd.

In the first half of this year, these companies further tapped their overseas customer base and pursued mergers and acquisitions to expand their global presence while their foreign counterparts spared attention for China's A-share stock market. The higher weight of overseas activities in their income statements was accompanied by their robust business operations.

Underwriting businesses stood out in this regard. For the six-month period, Haitong Securities was ranked third in the Hong Kong stock market in terms of the IPO numbers and completed its first listing deal at the U.S. stock market. It also handled the trading of 111 billion Hong Kong dollars of shares under the stock-connect programs between the H-share and A-share markets.

From January to June, CICC served 30 overseas IPO deals with a total worth of 2.587 U.S. dollars. CITIC Securities saw a surge of 140 percent in its brokerage services, handling 41.3 billion yuan of cash flows for overseas clients.