HSBC-Owned Hang Seng Bank Limits Crypto Companies to ‘Simple’ Accounts: Report

Crypto companies successful Hong Kong are having a hard clip getting firm slope accounts contempt the section government's propulsion for the territory to go a crypto hub.

A report from the Hong Kong Economic Journal quotes the manager of commercialized and lawsuit services astatine HSBC-owned Hang Seng Bank arsenic saying that portion licensed crypto companies tin unfastened a slope account, they’ll lone beryllium capable to get a "simple" one. The study didn't accidental what services were excluded from specified an account.

A spokesperson for HSBC did not instantly instrumentality a petition for comment.

Crypto companies applying to run successful Hong Kong are struggling to unfastened slope accounts owed to constricted staffing astatine the Securities and Futures Commission and reluctance from banks, adjacent though there's nary prohibition connected them offering services to crypto firms, CoinDesk antecedently reported. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA), the cardinal bank, has urged large lenders including HSBC, Standard Chartered and Bank of China to judge crypto exchanges arsenic clients.

“We person progressive dialogues with virtual plus players to speech views connected a scope of topics, including but not constricted to relationship opening," an HSBC spokesperson previously told CoinDesk. "We stay precise engaged connected policies and developments of this nascent manufacture successful Hong Kong.”

A spokesperson for Standard Chartered told CoinDesk successful a anterior interrogation that it has "regular dialogue" with regulators connected antithetic subjects.