Hong Kong's securities regulator has given conditional approval to a number of spot Bitcoin and Ethereum ETF applications.
China Asset Management and Harvest Global Investments announced in-principle approval of the application by the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) in separate statements on Monday morning. Harvest Global Investments has since removed the statement, likely pending an official statement from regulators.
Digital asset platform OSL announced in a separate press release that it will serve as a “sub-custodian partner” for China Asset Management and Harvest Global Investments ETFs.
Vocera Asset Management also reportedly announced that it has received conditional approval for its application for an ETF to be co-managed with Hashkey Capital.
OSL CEO Patrick Pang said in a statement that China Asset Management's appointment as sub-custodian “reflects the trend of trusted partnerships seen in the US market and is an important step forward for digital asset investments in Hong Kong. “This demonstrates our commitment to advancing the
The news comes just months after the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) approved multiple Spot Bitcoin ETF applications, which have seen billions of dollars in inflows since launching in January.
However, the US SEC has proven reluctant to approve Spot Ethereum ETFs, and has been slow to respond to multiple applications. Meanwhile, the Ethereum Foundation has revealed that it is being investigated by “state authorities,” although it has not been confirmed that they are U.S. regulators, leading to speculation among analysts that the Ethereum ETF could be approved. Pessimism is growing.
While mainland China has been cracking down on cryptocurrencies for years, Hong Kong launched a virtual asset trading platform (VATP) licensing regime in June 2023 to position itself as a crypto hub. introduced and accepted in this field.
In August 2023, HashKey and OSL became the first licensed cryptocurrency exchanges to serve retail users in Hong Kong.
