From 1993 until his death, Fok served as Vice Chairman of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference.

Fok reportedly made his first fortune gun-running into the mainland during the Korean War in the early 1950s, circumventing a United Nations arms embargo.

[4]: 58 In 2006, Forbes magazine listed Fok as the seventh wealthiest person in Hong Kong and the 181st in the world, with a fortune of US$3.7 billion.

The press frequently reports that Henry Fok had introduced Tung Chee Hwa to Jiang Zemin as a possible candidate of the first Hong Kong Chief Executive.

[5] Henry Fok helped Tung Chee Hwa out of a near-bankruptcy of his family's Orient Overseas Container Line in the 1980s.

Fok was one of the first Hong Kongers to have his casket draped in the Chinese national flag since the handover (the others being T. K. Ann and Wong Ker-lee).