On 21 May 2025, Hong Kong’s Legislative Council passed the Stablecoins Bill (Bill) to establish a new regulatory regime for activities involving fiat-referenced stablecoins, which is set to take effect by year-end. First gazetted on 6 December 2024, the Bill has since undergone a series of technical and textual amendments, which we discuss
SFC unveils new roadmap for further development of Hong Kong’s virtual assets regulatory framework
The Securities and Futures Commission’s (SFC) has on 19 February 2025 rolled out a new regulatory roadmap setting out its core guiding principles to continue Hong Kong’s development as a virtual assets (VA) hub. The roadmap adopts the “ASPIRe” slogan representing its 5 pillars – Access, Safeguards, Products
SFC revamps and expedites licensing process for VATPs
Introduction
The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) announced on 16 January 2025 that new applicants for a virtual asset trading platform (VATP) licence will be subject to a revamped and expedited external assessment process.
Previous external assessment process
VATP licence applicants who had submitted their application on or before
Hong Kong Debuts Stablecoins Bill
As 2024 draws to a close, Hong Kong has delivered on its promise by unveiling its draft Stablecoins Bill, a comprehensive framework for regulating fiat-referenced stablecoin issuers in Hong Kong. The bill generally aligns with the consultation conclusions of the stablecoin regime (finalized July 2024) and solidifies the Hong Kong Monetary Authority’s (HKMA
Webinar | The impact of global financial services regulation on tokenization
Join our panel of lawyers from Asia, Dubai, Europe, London and the US who will explore the key regulatory developments, issues and considerations and examine some real-world case studies.
Regulation Around the World: The UK Consumer Duty: a new global standard, or an outlier?
In this new edition of Regulation Around the World we review the UK Financial Conduct Authority’s (FCA) Consumer Duty (UK Consumer Duty) and see if other international financial services authorities have already got similar concepts in their frameworks; or whether the UK Consumer Duty not only sets a new UK standard
Regulation Around the World – Anti-money laundering update
In the latest instalment of our Regulation Around the World series, Financial Services partners in 15 jurisdictions cover recent developments concerning anti-money laundering.
Our global updater is accompanied by further analysis and insights in our Regulation Around the World podcast which is available now to stream and download. The podcast features speakers from the
SFC to step up supervision of asset managers after noting examples of serious misconduct
On 9 October 2024, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) issued a circular (the Circular) stating its intention to place greater emphasis on the supervision of asset management firms and reminding personnel of their regulatory obligations, after it identified various deficiencies and substandard conduct in respect of the management of private
New depositary licensing regime takes effect
From 2 October 2024, trustees and custodians of collective investment schemes (CIS) operating in Hong Kong and authorised by the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) for retail distribution must be licenced or registered to carry on the new Type 13 regulated activity (RA13) of “providing depository services for
Joint conclusions paper on enhancements to the OTC derivatives reporting regime published
In a move to facilitate the international standardization and harmonization of data elements in line with the Group of 20’s over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives market reform, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) (together, the Regulators) jointly published, following a two-month consultation from