TL;DR
- If nobody on your team lives in Singapore, you'll need a nominee director there, and as a rough guide that costs S$2,000 to S$5,000 a year. Hong Kong has no such rule.
- Hong Kong: 8.25% then 16.5%, and no GST. Singapore: 17% with generous early exemptions, plus 9% GST once taxable turnover passes S$1 million.
- Singapore lets small private companies skip the audit. Hong Kong only lets dormant ones off.
- With China in the picture, or no local director, Hong Kong fits better. With a Southeast Asian market and someone on the ground, Singapore does.
The resident director rule
Singapore requires every company to have at least one director who's ordinarily resident there, meaning a citizen, a permanent resident or someone on a suitable work pass. If that's not you or anyone on your team, you rent one. As a rough guide, nominee directors are quoted at S$2,000 to S$5,000 a year for as long as the company exists, often with a security deposit, and you're putting a stranger on your board.
Hong Kong has no residency requirement for directors. You can sit in London or Dubai and be the sole shareholder and sole director. The local pieces are the registered office and a company secretary based in Hong Kong, and a provider normally supplies both.
Government fees, taken alone, favour Singapore. It's S$315 there against HK$3,895 in Hong Kong for a company filed electronically in 2026/27, or roughly S$660. A nominee's fee uses up that difference within the first year.
Tax
Hong Kong charges 8.25% on the first HK$2 million of assessable profit and 16.5% above that, though only one company among connected entities gets the lower tier. It's territorial, so profits that genuinely arise outside Hong Kong aren't taxed, but the IRD treats that as a question of fact and you should expect to back an offshore claim with evidence. There's no VAT or GST at any size. Capital gains aren't taxed, and there's no withholding tax on dividends.
Singapore's headline rate is 17%, but a start-up exemption in the first three years of assessment and a smaller partial exemption afterwards pull the effective rate down a lot on modest profits. The start-up relief needs the company to be tax resident in Singapore and to have an individual shareholder holding at least 10%. The bigger difference for a growing business is GST. Once taxable turnover passes S$1 million you have to register and charge 9%, and a trading company can reach that quickly, although one selling almost entirely zero-rated exports can apply for exemption.
Take a company making HK$1.5 million in profit. In Hong Kong that's a HK$123,750 tax bill at the lower tier. In Singapore, if it qualifies for the start-up exemption, the bill is roughly comparable in the early years and higher once the relief runs out.
Compliance
In Hong Kong the company files an annual return within 42 days of each incorporation anniversary (HK$105 if it's on time), renews Business Registration every year (HK$2,350 in 2026/27), has its accounts audited every year unless it's formally dormant, and files a profits tax return backed by those audited accounts.
Singapore's annual return is due within seven months of year-end for a non-listed company. A private company can skip the audit if it meets two of three tests for two financial years running: revenue of S$10 million or less, total assets of S$10 million or less, and 50 or fewer employees. A typical startup qualifies. The tax return is due by 30 November, with an estimate of chargeable income within three months of year-end.
That audit exemption is usually worth a few thousand dollars a year to a small Singapore company. For a foreign-owned company with nobody in Singapore, not needing a nominee in Hong Kong tends to be worth more.
Banking
The two are fairly similar here. Aspire and Airwallex offer business accounts in both cities and take applications entirely online, though approval is their decision. The traditional banks in both are wary of foreign-owned companies with nobody local. If you can turn up in person, our impression is that Singapore's banks have been slightly easier, though that's anecdotal. Hong Kong's virtual banks are, as far as we can tell, built mainly for local SMEs, and their checks tend to assume a Hong Kong ID.
China
Hong Kong has the clear advantage for anything touching the Mainland. It has the CEPA trade arrangement and a currency pegged to the US dollar, and so much cross-border business already runs through the city that it's the obvious base.
The government's leaning into that. In the Policy Address of 16 September 2026 it said the GoGlobal Task Force had assisted more than 340 Mainland enterprises since October 2025, with things like listing in Hong Kong and meeting overseas compliance rules. It also said a 5% or half-rate profits tax concession may be offered, depending on each company's investment plan and contribution to the economy, to attract enterprises that set up headquarters here to manage supply chain and sourcing. A tax bill for corporate treasury centres is expected in LegCo in the first half of 2027.
Which one, then?
Go with Hong Kong if you won't have anyone living in Singapore, if China's part of the business, if you'd rather not deal with GST, or if you want a board with no nominee on it. Go with Singapore if you've got a local director anyway, if your market is Southeast Asia, or if the audit exemption makes a real difference at your size.
Some businesses end up with both. Hong Kong's BUD Fund counts Singapore among its target markets, and an approved project can include part-funding for the professional fees of setting up the new entity there, capped at 20% of the project's spending.
