In a global first, Hong Kong opens secondary trading for tokenised public funds

The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) on Monday approved the world’s first-ever secondary trading of tokenised public funds, reinforcing the city’s push to build the region’s leading ecosystem for tokenised finance.

Investors can now trade two tokenised money market funds – the Hong Kong dollar and US dollar versions of the ChinaAMC Digital Money Market Fund – on an SFC-licensed virtual asset trading platform (VATP).

“For retail investors, this marks a vital upgrade in time sovereignty over fund management,” said Katie He, head of strategic business at China Asset Management (Hong Kong), noting that trading was now available around the clock, including weekends and public holidays.

The initiative was jointly launched by ChinaAMC (Hong Kong), the local arm of one of China’s largest fund managers, and PantherTrade, a VATP backed by the fintech company Futu Holdings.

“Together, we have proven that liquidity can be unlocked without altering the legal structure of public mutual funds or lowering investor protection standards,” He said.

The SFC adapted existing regulatory frameworks governing VATPs and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), which already support secondary-market trading, to enable trading of tokenised public funds.

Previously, investors could access these funds only through primary dealing with a fund manager during conventional trading hours.

He said the innovation extended “well beyond the product itself”, reflecting “Hong Kong’s institutional advantage in compliant digital financial innovation, as well as the execution capability of the overall market”.

The regulator’s new framework added “an important building block – 24/7 trading capability – to Hong Kong’s evolving tokenisation ecosystem”, said Elisa Ng, executive director of investment products at the SFC, in a statement.

The move comes as Hong Kong authorities and financial institutions step up efforts to expand the use of tokenisation, hoping to cement the city’s position as a fintech leader.

HSBC, for example, on Monday launched HSBCnio, a platform that allows clients’ artificial intelligence tools to access authorised bank account and transaction information on a read-only basis, with the goal of integrating AI into treasury operations.

Hong Kong’s Fintech Week x StartmeupHK 2026, which kicks off next week, expects to welcome more than 45,000 attendees from around the world.