Hong Kong’s FinTech Week faces off with Singapore event as cities jostle to be Asia’s financial innovation hub

The highlight of Hong Kong’s fintech event next week is expected to be a relaxation of cryptocurrency rules for retail investors

The event coincides with a similar one in Singapore, which is seen as leading Hong Kong in progressive crypto rules and opening up to the world

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Hong Kong’s annual FinTech Week event is expected to bring good news for crypto investors this year with a relaxation on rules regarding retail trading. Photo: SCMP/ K. Y. Cheng

Published: 4:33pm, 28 Oct 2022Updated: 4:39pm, 28 Oct 2022

Hong Kong’s five-day government-backed FinTech Week, which kicks off on Monday, is set to attract 20,000 attendees and 3 million online viewers as the city seeks to showcase its commitment to financial innovation while a similar event takes place in Singapore.

Hong Kong, which lags behind Singapore in reopening to the rest of the world by relaxing Covid-19 control measures, is fighting to convince investors that it remains the best place for developing the future of payments, digital currency and Web3 technologies.

In a key policy divergence from mainland China, where cryptocurrencies are banned and seen as a threat to financial stability, Hong Kong is likely to allow exchanges and other intermediaries to sell assets directly to retail investors. This change of heart comes four years after the city limited exchanges to serving only those with portfolios of HK$8 million (US$1 million) or more. Singapore, meanwhile, is headed in the opposite direction, with plans to raise the threshold for trading cryptocurrencies to protect retail investors.

FinTech Week, which includes a two-day conference on Monday and Tuesday, is scheduled back-to-back with the Global Financial Leaders’s Investment Summit, which starts on Wednesday. That event is designed to showcase to global bankers that the city’s status as an international financial centre remains intact despite more than two years of travel restrictions, an exodus of talent, a stock market in free fall, and an effort to “clean up” civil society under the Beijing-imposed national security law.

Both events have been promoted heavily, with banners and posters decorating city streets. The conference includes a long list of speakers from fintech, crypto and traditional finance firms. However, Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po, a key host for both events, is unlikely to attend in person after testing positive for Covid-19 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on Thursday.

Tickets for FinTech week are on sale for US$599 for in-person events and US$89 for online attendance.

Hong Kong’s business community has high hopes for the week, especially among those who have been eager for a change in the city’s approach to crypto regulation.

“This year’s FinTech Week coincides with the long-awaited opening up of the city, and is important as it will set the tone for the new administration and signal to the world that Hong Kong is open for business again,” said Lucy Gazmararian, founder and managing partner of Hong Kong-based Token Bay Capital.