Standard Chartered puts Hong Kong's regulated HKD stablecoin behind the bank counter

Anchorpoint's own transparency page puts the size of this in proportion. Alongside the circulating supply it reported 658,160 in transaction volume during Beta Access, dated the same 19 August ^[9]. That works out to about 1.26 turns of the entire float across the whole beta ^[17]. As settlement traffic it is nothing; as evidence the plumbing connects, it is the whole point.

The change is at the door, not in the token. HKDAP still redeems one for one into Hong Kong dollars ^[3] and still runs on Ethereum mainnet with access confined to selected institutional and corporate users ^[10]. What is new is who hands it over. Cryptopolitan's read of the announcement is that asset managers and multinationals can now look at blockchain settlement without leaving the banks they already use ^[2], and for a regulated fund the identity of the distributor is most of the product.

The economics run one way. Anchorpoint was set up in February 2025 as a joint venture with HKT and Animoca Brands, Standard Chartered is its largest shareholder, and the bank's trustee holds the reserve assets backing the token ^[4]. So one group owns a stake in the issuer, holds the reserves, and is now the sole bank channel into the coin ^[18]. Every unit minted is Hong Kong dollars parked inside that group. The rail cannot grow without the reserve book growing with it.

The problem being aimed at is real enough. A tokenized fund unit can move instantly while the cash leg still travels through older banking systems, and HKDAP is meant to be cash that moves at the same speed so both sides land together ^[7]. Anchorpoint's chief executive Dominic Maffei called the bank's involvement a milestone that provides a trusted channel for the token to grow ^[14]. The channel is genuinely new. The volume that would make it a rail is a 2026 promise: on the bank's own schedule, at least two quarters sit between the April licence and the first planned institutional settlement ^[20].

HSBC holds the other licence, has not shipped a token, aims at the second half of 2026, and could route one into PayMe and its 3.3 million users ^[13]. Measure that against the only regulated Hong Kong dollar token actually live: its entire float, at par, comes to roughly 16 Hong Kong cents per PayMe user ^[19]. Anchorpoint has said its own retail access could open as early as the end of 2026 ^[11]. Whichever token reaches households first will have to be minted in quantities neither issuer has yet shown it can place.