Fidelity International has received the green light to establish a wholly-owned onshore mutual fund business in China, becoming only the third global asset manager to do so.
Fidelity said in a statement on Friday that its wholly foreign-owned enterprise, FIL Fund Management (China) Company, had been granted permission to conduct securities and futures business in China by the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC).
Fidelity will now be able to offer onshore investment products and solutions to retail clients and asset management services to institutional clients, it said.
Fidelity has 1,900 employees split between three offices in Shanghai, Dalian and Beijing. Under the previous qualified foreign institutional investor scheme, it was awarded a quota of $1.2bn, one of the largest for any fund manager, and it was also one of the first global asset managers to register with the Asset Management Association of China as a private fund management company.
Last month, Neuberger Berman became only the second asset manager to receive approval from the CSRC to launch a wholly owned onshore mutual fund business in China. BlackRock was the first to get the go-ahead in June last year.
