Hong Kong Regulators to Host a Meeting Between Crypto Firms and Local Banks (Report)

The financial watchdogs of Hong Kong will reportedly host a meeting between domestic cryptocurrency businesses and bankers. The initiative could ease financing for the industry as the region seeks to emerge as a global digital asset hub.

Crypto firms based in Hong Kong have supposedly received support from leading Chinese banks in the past several weeks, although the authorities of the most populated country are predominantly against the asset class.

Another Step Towards the Crypto Goal

As reported by Bloomberg, the HKMA and the Securities and Futures Commission plan “to facilitate direct dialog” between local cryptocurrency entities and banking institutions to “share practical experiences and perspectives in opening and maintaining bank accounts.” 

The session, which aims to establish closer ties between the two sectors, is scheduled for April 28 at the Hong Kong Monetary Authority. 

The meeting comes at a time when several banking institutions in the USA, such as Signature Bank and Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), revealed operational difficulties and were shut down by regulators. Both entities had multiple crypto clients affected by the closures.

As CryptoPotato reported earlier this week, the Hong Kong subsidiaries of the Bank of China, the Bank of Communications, and the Shanghai Pudong Development Bank have already started offering their services to domestic digital asset entities.

Beijing’s positive stance contrasts the ban on all cryptocurrency operations which the central bank and government enforced in 2021.

Is Hong Kong’s Push Towards Crypto Bullish?

The authorities of Hong Kong have recently laid out plans to turn the special administrative region of China into a blockchain center. They vowed to legalize cryptocurrency retail trading and design a friendly regulatory framework for the industry.

According to BitMEX’s co-founder – Arthur Hayes – such a step could trigger the next bull market. He argued that a possible rally will be further stimulated when China steps in:

“Hong Kong’s friendly reorientation towards crypto portends China reasserting itself in the crypto capital markets. When China loves crypto, the bull market will come back. It will be a slow process, but the red shoots are budding.”

Hayes thinks the current economic turbulence that reigns across the globe could force the country to distribute its US dollar stash earned from its massive export into an alternative market. Warming up to crypto might be one way to do so, the American entrepreneur concluded.