Hong Kong Proposes Regulated Stablecoin Trading and Tokenized MMF Payments

Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee announced in his policy address that the government is advancing measures to permit trading of regulated stablecoins on authorized virtual asset platforms and utilize tokenized money market funds (MMFs) for payments. The Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) will revise its licensing system for virtual asset businesses and improve regulatory frameworks for issuing and trading real-world asset (RWA) tokenization products. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) plans to introduce central bank digital currency (CBDC) payment functionality and 24-hour operational systems by year-end through Project EnsembleTX, while exploring additional use cases for deposit tokens.