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(Kitco News) - As Hong Kong continues to implement measures designed to transform the region into a global blockchain hub, the Hong Kong Securities and Investment Institute (HKSI) has announced a plan to train digital asset traders to give them the necessary expertise to effectively engage with the asset class.
HKSI is responsible for training and conducting licensing exams for brokers and asset managers operating in Hong Kong, and is backed by the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC), Hong Kong’s financial markets regulator.
According to a report from the South China Morning Post, HKSI Chair Colin Shaftesley said the institute will be running “a number of training programs and seminars on virtual assets in the next few months for those who would like to enhance their knowledge on virtual assets.”
Shaftesley noted that young residents in the region have been interested in digital assets “for quite some time,” and said, “The virtual asset industry has been keen to be regulated because if you are regulated, it gives the industry more confidence, and they can market themselves more comfortably saying we are regulated.”
The HKSI will be responsible for providing the training and licensing examination, but it will be up to the SFC to decide when the first examination takes place.
Along with training in digital assets, the HKSI will also focus on offering training for the wealth management industry to support the Hong Kong government’s plan to attract more family offices to the city.
During his first policy address in October, Hong Kong’s leader John Lee Ka-chiu said the city aims to attract up to 200 family offices to the region by 2025.
“Our wealth management sector program offers internships for young people that want to go into that space,” Shaftesley said. “As the implementation agent for a government-funded program, we provide financial support to asset wealth management companies to cover a portion of interns’ salary, helping to introduce students and young people into the asset management industry.”
Shaftesley, who has worked in Hong Kong since 1988 and has been a member of HKSI since 1998, said the Hong Kong market has seen sweeping changes over the past 25 years, with young entrants more interested in the fields of fintech, green financing, ESG (Environmental, social and governance), risk management and other new initiatives.
This change was hastened by the Covid-19 pandemic, which led to the widespread roll-out of online training courses in lieu of physical classroom lessons.
“The pandemic did not hurt the conduct of training or examinations,” Shaftesley said, highlighting the seven percent rise in training enrollments between 2019 and 2023. “This is thanks to the advanced learning platform introduced in 2017 to offer more digital learning solutions.”
And to help broaden the pool of applicants and attract talent to Hong Kong, Shaftesley said the HKSI plans to launch remote online examination platforms in September so that candidates can take the Hong Kong licensed examination even when they are in the UK, U.S. or Japan.
According to the HKSI website, the first educational webinar, entitled “How Digital Assets can Co-Exist within Traditional Finance’s IT Architecture,” will take place on July 20.
The webinar will cover “blockchain development and how Hong Kong compares to the rest of the World; the technology around digital assets custody, tokenization, and some of the risks involved; how small companies can apply blockchain and potentially gain a competitive advantage; and critical success factors in the rollout and what to consider.”
Senior executives, Managers-In-Charge (MICs) of licensed corporations, asset/wealth managers, VA-related practitioners, compliance officers and other professionals who may consider investing in virtual assets through Hong Kong are encouraged to attend.
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Hong Kong has rapidly risen in the ranks of jurisdictions attracting blockchain firms over the past year as the city has diverged from China’s hard-line anti-crypto stance to accept the industry with open arms.
In February, the city released its 2023-2024 budget, which reaffirmed the government’s pro-crypto initiatives and included new areas of support for the digital assets industry.
“Every generation of technological reform brings about new applications and fresh opportunities, and even disrupts the mode of business operation,” Hong Kong Financial Secretary Paul Chan said with the release of the budget. “We must keep up with the times and seize this golden opportunity to spearhead innovation development.”
On June 1, new regulations went into effect that enabled retail trading of digital assets in Hong Kong, and the government has been actively pressuring banks in the region to onboard cryptocurrency exchanges as clients.
