Hong Kong Creates a Fintech Sandbox for Banks

​The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) last week announced the launch of a financial technology sandbox, to allow banks to test new innovative products that do not yet meet compliance standards. The new regime is valid as of September 6.

The announcement comes a few months following similar action by various governments around the world, including the UK, Singapore, Australia and France, but more recently also in other countries in the area, including Malaysia, Thailand and last but not least Japan. The main difference here is that the the regulatory sandbox would be not applicable to standalone fintech firms, but it’s only applied to banks. We believe this is a fundamental benefit, given the disruptive innovation being leveraged around the world in innovative banking institutions.

This initiative is the third one in less than a year announced by Hong Kong. At the start of the year they established a fintech steering committee, before that the financial regulator announced, just two months later, an office to promote fintech through the organization of industry events.

The good news of “Fintech Supervisory Sandbox” was brought by Norman Chan, Chief Executive of HKMA, in a keynote speech at Treasury Markets Summit 2016. Going further talking about the regulatory framework sandbox he says that it “allows banks to conduct testing and trial of newly developed technologies and applications on a pilot basis. Within the Sandbox, banks can try out their new Fintech products without the need to achieve full compliance with the HKMA’s usual supervisory requirements.

Read the whole article on Crowd Valley News.