Leaf Hua Li

Leaf Hua Li founded Futu Holdings in 2012 while working as an engineer at Tencent, driven by the conviction that mobile technology could democratize stock trading across Asia. Futu operates two brokerage platforms: Moomoo (the international-facing brand, used in Singapore, the US, Australia, Japan, and Malaysia) and Futubull (focused on Hong Kong). Tencent Holdings remains a significant shareholder, providing brand trust and technology ecosystem support. Futu has grown to serve over 23 million registered users and approximately 2+ million paying clients. The platform provides commission-free or low-cost trading in US stocks, Hong Kong stocks, Singapore stocks, Australian stocks, options, futures, and mutual funds — all through a mobile-first experience with social features (community discussion, financial news, paper trading, analyst ratings). The Moomoo app has been particularly successful in Singapore (where it has become one of the most popular brokerage apps) and is growing rapidly in the US and Australia. The company's revenue model is based on brokerage commissions, margin financing interest income, and wealth management product distribution. Key stock drivers include paying client growth (the most important metric), client assets growth, trading volume, margin financing balances, interest rate environment (higher rates boost margin financing income and cash deposit revenue), geographic expansion (particularly Japan, Malaysia, and potentially other Asian markets), Chinese ADR trading volume, competitive dynamics against Interactive Brokers, Tiger Brokers, and local platforms, and regulatory developments in each operating market.