The Hong Kong Treasury plans to submit a draft regulation on virtual assets and promote the trial operation of gold clearing

On January 30th, the Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury of Hong Kong, Patrick Hui, stated at a policy briefing in the Legislative Council that the Treasury and the Securities and Futures Commission are working on the details of the regulatory system for virtual asset trading and custody services. They plan to submit four draft regulations on the regulation of virtual asset service providers to the Legislative Council this year. At the same time, the governing body of the Hong Kong Gold Central Clearing System has been established, with the goal of conducting trial operations within this year and setting a target of expanding gold storage to over 2000 tons within three years, in order to build a regional gold reserve hub. In addition, the Finance and Treasury Bureau is studying and optimizing tax relief measures for the Treasury Center, exploring shortening the stock settlement cycle from T+2 to T+1, and planning to automatically exchange tax information related to encrypted asset transactions with other tax jurisdictions from 2028.