Asia's crypto financial center, Hong Kong and Singapore are quite catching up!
Shall we go to Hong Kong or Singapore?
It's really a problem for Web3 entrepreneurs.
In November 2022, Hong Kong Financial Technology Week and Singapore Financial Technology Week will be held at the same time, pushing the competition to a climax.
It can be said that this policy declaration of Hong Kong demonstrates the determination and commitment to explore financial innovation with the industry, and also clearly states its position: while actively embracing innovation, it must have a regulatory support that is adaptive and up-to-date to properly control risks and create preconditions for orderly and vigorous development of the market.
Ravi Menon, the managing director of the Bank of Singapore, immediately said on the "Singapore Financial Technology Week" on November 3 that Singapore hopes to become a digital asset center.
In Web3, the battle for a new port in full swing has set sail. Web3, an industry ecology dedicated to the capitalization of data, aims to change the current situation of excessive concentration and monopoly of Internet data. Through data token, more companies can produce, refine and create valuable data, and individuals have more opportunities to master their own data, assets and digital identities.
Regardless of geographical advantages and strategic locations, Hong Kong and Singapore have certain similarities, and the cultural circle is quite close. Therefore, not only in the Web3 field, the two are difficult to get rid of. In recent years, in finance, scientific innovation, logistics and shipping, it is hard to avoid the "New Port Competition", and the development process of the two is also quite twin.
From the perspective of industry, both sides have their own advantages and their paths begin to diverge. Under the guidance of the government, Singapore has prominent advantages in high-end manufacturing, port logistics, headquarters economy and other fields, and even in recent years, it has the tendency to catch up with Hong Kong in the direction of education. Take high-end manufacturing as an example. In the past 40 years, Singapore's manufacturing industry has accounted for more than 20% of GDP, especially high-end manufacturing industry. Among them, the pharmaceutical and biological products industries have grown even more than 30 times, and the semiconductor industry has led the way. However, Hong Kong's local manufacturing has gone down all the way. In recent years, the added value of the manufacturing industry has not accounted for more than 5%, and high-end manufacturing is rare.
For a long time, Hong Kong's regulatory framework was not friendly to Web3's innovative enterprises, which made FTX have to spend a lot of time looking for countries and regions with more perfect regulatory frameworks in order to develop more in compliance. Finally, it chose to relocate its headquarters to Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas. This country is located between North and South America and hopes to become the crypto financial center of the Americas. Through the more friendly DARE Act, it has also attracted another crypto giant OKX, who believes that the Bahamas, on the one hand, favors crypto asset institutions in terms of policy. On the other hand, the unique geographical location of the Bahamas can serve as a center, which is conducive to expanding its business to North and South America.
In addition, Singapore believes that cryptocurrencies are legal. The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) divides cryptocurrencies into three categories: practical tokens, securities tokens and payment tokens. Among them, the practical token is not regulated, and the securities token and the payment token are managed by two special regulations, namely, the Digital Token Sales Guide and the Payment Service Law. From these perspectives, Singapore is indeed in the forefront in Asia.
Those who formulate policy details earlier and issue licenses earlier will get more encryption institutions and Web3 enterprises settled in.
The competition between Hong Kong and Singapore is a profile of the global development of Web3. Today, Web3 is becoming a global arena.
Looking around the world, Silicon Valley, New York, Miami, London, Dubai, Tokyo... almost all international financial centers and science and technology centers have announced that they attach importance to the development of Web3 and virtual asset ecology, and it is rare for political figures from many countries to simultaneously express their attention to Web3 this year.
In Asia, in addition to Singapore, Bangkok, Thailand, Seoul, South Korea, and Tokyo, Japan are all cities with very active development of Web3 and strong competitiveness in the future.
Going faster also means that we need to bear stronger regulatory pressure and higher financial risks. This is the price to be borne by "the first few crabeaters".
The tide of scientific and technological innovation in the past has made the economy and industry develop by leaps and bounds. Although the development process will inevitably encounter twists and turns, the long-term results are still worth affirming for the benefit and inspiration of future generations. The foam explosion of the science network in 2000 made many people wary of the development of science and technology, but science and technology still developed platform economy and network economy according to its own path in the environment of mobile terminals and networking. The foam and turbulence of the virtual asset market in the past few years have caused interference to the investment market, but the development of financial innovation has not stopped during this period. The industry is constantly evolving in technology and applications.
Therefore, we also believe that on the premise of maintaining security and appropriately controlling risks, embracing innovation will certainly bring new strength to economic and industrial development. The development of its potential and innovation of its application require the development of relevant technologies and the entire ecosystem, including virtual currency, virtual asset exchange, the development of the meta universe, and the innovative application of token based securities issuance, trade finance, etc. When considering the overall development direction, one of the core aspects is that if finance serves the real economy, technological innovation should also play a role in serving the real economy.
It is particularly important for countries and cities to choose the core or marginal position in the global ecology during the development of Web3. Singapore is a neutral country. It naturally has the conditions to attract capital. It is developing this advantage to the extreme. For Hong Kong, it has more choices. Behind it, there is a natural flow of mainland technical talents with the highest cost performance and the most hardworking in the world. Its financial port has a long history. It has a large number of high-quality financial institutions, extremely professional financial talents, and very rich cultural resources.
If Hong Kong can continue its current momentum in policy and propose a breakthrough and globally leading regulatory policy, it may inject more feasibility into its Web3 vision. Hong Kong may still be the most promising player in the Asian Crypto Financial Center and Web3 Center.