Why do the rights and interests of customers short-selling securities belong to securities companies?

According to the Measures for the Administration of Margin Trading of Securities Companies, Essential Clauses of Margin Trading Contracts and other relevant regulations, if a securities issuer distributes investment income, distributes securities to securities holders or issues securities with preemptive rights free of charge after customers are integrated into the securities and before the securities are returned, the customers shall pay securities or funds equal to the income from integration into the securities according to the stipulations of the margin trading contract.

The rights and interests involved in margin trading include but are not limited to:

1. The securities registration and settlement institution confirms the fact that the securities company is entrusted to hold securities according to the records in the securities account guaranteed by the credit exchange of the clients of the securities company, and registers it on the register of securities holders in the name of the securities company.

2. For the securities recorded in the customer's credit transaction secured securities account, the securities company shall exercise the rights of the securities issuer in its own name for the benefit of the customer.

When a securities company exercises its rights over a securities issuer, it shall solicit the opinions of its customers in advance and act according to their opinions.

If the customer fails to express his opinions, the securities company shall not exercise its rights against the issuer.

The rights of the securities issuer mentioned in the preceding paragraph refer to the rights arising from the holding of securities to request the convening of securities holders' meetings, attend securities holders' meetings, propose, vote, subscribe for allotment shares, request the distribution of investment income and so on.

3. Where a securities registration and settlement institution is entrusted by a securities issuer to distribute investment income in the form of securities, it shall record the distributed securities in the securities account guaranteed by the customer credit transaction of the securities company, and change the detailed data of the customer credit securities account accordingly.

Where a securities registration and settlement institution is entrusted by a securities issuer to distribute investment income in cash, it shall transfer the allocated funds into the securities company's credit transaction fund settlement account.

After receiving the funds, the securities company shall notify the commercial bank to change the detailed data of the customer's credit fund account.

4. If the securities issuer distributes the investment income, distributes the securities to the securities holders or issues the securities that the securities holders have the preemptive right after the customers are integrated into the securities and before the securities are returned, the customers shall pay the securities or funds equivalent to the integrated securities income to the securities company in accordance with the provisions of the margin financing and securities lending contract.

5. The stocks held by the securities company through the customer credit transaction guarantee securities account are not included in its own stocks, and the securities company does not need to fulfill the corresponding information reporting, disclosure or tender offer obligation due to the change of the number of stocks in the account.

When the total number of shares of listed companies and their rights and interests held by customers and their concerted parties through ordinary securities accounts and credit securities accounts or the increase or decrease thereof reaches the prescribed proportion, they shall fulfill the corresponding obligations of information reporting, disclosure or tender offer according to law.

References:

Necessary clauses of margin financing and securities lending contracts and measures for the administration of margin financing and securities lending business of securities companies.