Hong Kong’s Paul Chan Says First Stablecoin Licenses Are Only the Start

• Paul Chan said Hong Kong’s first two stablecoin licenses are only an early step in the city’s broader digital asset strategy.
• He also pointed to cross-border payments, tokenized bonds and a new Web3-AI committee as the next areas of focus.

Hong Kong is making it clear that its first stablecoin licenses are not meant to be the headline, but the opening move. Finance chief Paul Chan Mo-po said the recent approval of the city’s first two stablecoin licenses should be seen as the beginning of a wider push into digital assets and blockchain-based finance. His message was fairly direct. Hong Kong remains open to Web3 firms, but the city wants the sector judged less by slogans and more by whether it solves practical problems. Stablecoins are being framed as payments infrastructure Chan said one of the clearest use cases lies in cross-border payments, where stablecoins could help reduce friction in moving money across jurisdictions. That emphasis is notable because it keeps Hong Kong’s digital asset agenda tied to financial plumbing rather than speculation. The city has been trying to position itself as a regulated hub for tokenized finance, and stablecoins fit neatly into that strategy. If they can move money more efficiently across borders, especially in Asia’s trade-heavy environment, they become easier to defend as infrastructure rather than merely crypto products. Tokenized bonds and AI now sit alongside the Web3 push Chan also highlighted the city’s progress in tokenized bonds, saying Hong Kong has already issued more than $2 billion worth of them. That matters because tokenized bond issuance gives the government a more concrete track record than many jurisdictions that still speak mostly in pilots and policy papers. The next step, according to Chan, is broader coordination. He said Hong Kong is forming a dedicated committee to explore how Web3 and artificial intelligence can work together, a sign that officials are already looking beyond digital assets as a standalone category. That combination is worth watching. Stablecoins and tokenized bonds address the movement and representation of value. AI raises a different question, how those systems are managed, automated and scaled. For Hong Kong, the larger ambition now looks increasingly clear. It wants to be more than a city that licenses crypto businesses. It wants to be a place where regulated digital finance, tokenized assets and emerging infrastructure are built into one longer-term strategy.