{"id":68945,"date":"2022-10-21T18:10:34","date_gmt":"2022-10-21T15:10:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/forklog.com\/en\/?p=68945"},"modified":"2025-09-07T17:03:57","modified_gmt":"2025-09-07T14:03:57","slug":"hong-kong-regulator-weighs-easing-crypto-trading-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/hong-kong-regulator-weighs-easing-crypto-trading-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Hong Kong Regulator Weighs Easing Crypto Trading Rules"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) is considering allowing retail investors to invest directly in virtual assets. This was stated by the regulator&#8217;s head of fintech, Elizabeth Wong, according to the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/tech\/policy\/article\/3196234\/hong-kong-promises-its-cryptocurrency-stance-separate-mainland-chinas\">South China Morning Post<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>In her words, the initiative marks a shift away from the SFC&#8217;s position that permits cryptocurrency trading on centralized exchanges only to professional investors. These include individuals with portfolios of at least HK$8 million ($1 million).<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\">\n<p>\u201cWe have four years of experience regulating the industry [\u2026]. We believe, in fact, that this is a good time to consider carefully whether we would adhere to this requirement only for professional investors,\u201d Wong said.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>According to the report, industry participants had previously expressed concerns about current cryptocurrency trading rules. In their view, the restrictions deter companies, and the lack of regulatory clarity undermines Hong Kong&#8217;s status as a \u2018centre of virtual assets\u2019.<\/p>\n<p>In 2019, the SFC published rules aimed at defining the regulatory framework for fund management companies that direct more than 10% of their portfolios into cryptocurrencies.<\/p>\n<p>That same period, the regulator introduced licensing requirements for \u201cvirtual asset trading platforms.\u201d Permission to operate in Hong Kong was required if at least one security token was traded on the platform.<\/p>\n<p>Later, the Commission decided <a href=\"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/news\/hong-kong-to-extend-regulation-to-all-cryptocurrency-exchanges\">to extend<\/a> regulation to all Bitcoin exchanges.<\/p>\n<p>Earlier in 2021, the Hong Kong Financial Services and Treasury Bureau began drafting a bill that <a href=\"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/news\/hong-kong-plans-to-ban-bitcoin-exchanges-from-operating-without-a-licence\">bans<\/a> cryptocurrency trading platforms from operating without a licence.<\/p>\n<p>Read ForkLog&#8217;s bitcoin news on our <a href=\"https:\/\/telegram.me\/forklog\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Telegram<\/a> \u2014 cryptocurrency news, prices and analysis.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) is considering allowing retail investors to invest directly in virtual assets, according to Elizabeth Wong, head of the regulator&#8217;s Financial Technology Department, as reported by the South China Morning Post.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":68946,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"select":"1","news_style_id":"1","cryptorium_level":"","_short_excerpt_text":"","creation_source":"","_metatest_mainpost_news_update":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[1269,832,36],"class_list":["post-68945","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-cryptocurrencies","tag-hong-kong","tag-regulation"],"aioseo_notices":[],"amp_enabled":true,"views":"30","promo_type":"1","layout_type":"1","short_excerpt":"","is_update":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68945","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=68945"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68945\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":68947,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/68945\/revisions\/68947"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/68946"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=68945"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=68945"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/u1f987.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=68945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}