HONG KONG, April 10, 2026 — The Hong Kong Monetary Authority has awarded the city's first stablecoin issuer licences to HSBC Holdings, a Standard Chartered-led joint venture referred to in reports as Anchorpoint Financial, and crypto exchange OSL, formally opening a regulated market for fiat-backed digital currencies in one of Asia's largest financial centres.

The three approvals come from a pool of 36 formal applications and follow years of regulatory groundwork, including a sandbox programme launched in March 2024. The HKMA had signalled from the start that initial licences would go to only three or four issuers. The awards arrive roughly ten days after Hong Kong missed a self-imposed March 2026 deadline; Financial Secretary Paul Chan had announced in February that approvals would begin that month. The HKMA provided no explanation for the delay.

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What the Licences Cover

All approved issuers must operate under the Stablecoins Ordinance, which took effect on August 1, 2025. The law requires 100 percent backing by high-quality liquid assets at all times, with the market value of reserves required to equal or exceed the par value of the circulating supply. Holders must be able to redeem at par within one business day, with no discretionary gates permitted. Algorithmic stablecoins are explicitly prohibited. Issuers are also barred from paying interest to stablecoin holders, a constraint with direct commercial implications given the prevalence of yield-bearing alternatives in the broader crypto market and a point of active debate in regulatory circles globally. All licensees must additionally maintain AML/CFT controls and segregate client assets. Non-bank applicants must hold a minimum of HKD 25 million (roughly USD 3.2 million) in paid-up capital, though that requirement is waived for licensed banks such as HSBC and Standard Chartered.

The joint venture referred to in reports as Anchorpoint Financial, anchored by Standard Chartered (Hong Kong), gaming and Web3 firm Animoca Brands, and telecoms operator HKT, intends to issue a Hong Kong dollar-denominated stablecoin targeting both institutional clients and retail users, with a focus on cross-border payments and Web3 applications. HSBC has not publicly disclosed which currency its stablecoin will track. OSL, an SFC-licensed crypto exchange, is the only non-bank entity in the initial cohort.

An HKMA deputy chief executive (whose name was not confirmed in HKMA communications), quoted in the South China Morning Post, said: "The two applicants have experience in traditional financial and risk management, which fits the mission of stablecoins that aim to bridge traditional finance and digital finance." The original attribution to "two applicants" raises an unresolved question about whether the deputy was referring specifically to the two bank-led applicants, HSBC and the Standard Chartered-led consortium, with OSL addressed separately in communications not recovered from available sources.

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Market Context

Global stablecoin transaction volume reached USD 33 trillion in 2025, a 72 percent increase year-on-year, according to industry trackers CoinLaw and Stablecoin Insider. Stablecoins now account for roughly 30 percent of all on-chain crypto volume. Tether's USDT held approximately 62 percent of the global market by capitalisation as of mid-2025, with total stablecoin market cap sitting near USD 309 billion as of January 2026. Cross-border payments represent one of the clearest near-term use cases: stablecoins handled about 3 percent of global cross-border payment volume in 2025, but projections from payments firm BVNK suggest that share could reach 20 percent, representing roughly USD 60 trillion, within five years.

Standard Chartered Group CEO Bill Winters said in a statement that "digital assets are here to stay and the development of different forms of tokenised money is integral to the advancement of this industry." Animoca Brands President Evan Auyang added that "stablecoins are one of the best proven and most widely recognised use cases for Web3."

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Regional Implications

The licences carry particular weight for South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa, two regions where Standard Chartered operates an extensive banking network. Stablecoin volumes in South Asia grew approximately 80 percent year-on-year to roughly USD 300 billion in the first half of 2025, driven largely by USDT use in remittances and informal trade finance, according to TRM Labs. A bank-backed, HKMA-regulated HKD stablecoin from an institution with that regional footprint could provide an alternative to SWIFT-based correspondent banking for Hong Kong-South Asia and Hong Kong-Africa trade flows.

Because Hong Kong maintains a currency board peg to the US dollar, an HKD stablecoin offers dollar-proximate stability while being governed by a local regulatory framework. For emerging market businesses seeking a credible jurisdiction outside the United States or European Union, the Stablecoins Ordinance is notable for not restricting which reference currencies can be used. Non-HKD stablecoins tied to other fiat currencies can in principle be issued under a Hong Kong licence, which positions the city as a potential regulatory home for projects serving markets that lack their own stablecoin frameworks.

Animoca's involvement also opens a distribution path through Southeast Asia's and Africa's Web3 gaming ecosystems, where micropayments and NFT settlement currently rely predominantly on USD-pegged tokens.

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What Comes Next

Hong Kong still trails Singapore operationally. StraitsX and Paxos received full licences from the Monetary Authority of Singapore by July 2024, and the XSGD stablecoin is already accepted at Grab merchants and Alipay Plus stores. StraitsX has recorded USD 1.8 billion in cumulative transaction volume. Japan offers a structurally instructive parallel: JPYC launched in October 2025 as the first FSA-regulated yen stablecoin, and megabanks MUFG, SMBC, and Mizuho are each pursuing their own stablecoin initiatives, a model that closely resembles Hong Kong's bank-heavy initial cohort. Hong Kong's approach suggests a distinct strategic posture from Singapore's retail fintech emphasis: the priority appears to be institutional settlement and mainland China market access rather than consumer adoption.

The HKMA has not indicated when it will expand the licenced issuer pool beyond the initial three approvals, and no timeline has been given for when the approved stablecoins will enter circulation. For the remaining 33 applicants, the regulator's silence on next steps leaves the path for non-bank and crypto-native issuers uncertain.