Hong Kong’s Crypto Frenzy: A Day That Could Move Markets

by

Finance

What the day whispers to us

  • Hong Kong officials used the opening day of Consensus Hong Kong to signal a push into digital assets, pledging stablecoin licenses as soon as next month and new rules for perpetual contracts.
  • Speakers framed crypto as central to trends like an AI-driven “machine economy,” with Financial Secretary Paul Chan envisioning AI agents transacting onchain.
  • Market voices including Anthony Scaramucci and Tom Lee urged investors to look past recent price declines, with Scaramucci reiterating a $150,000 bitcoin target tied to U.S. legislation and Lee calling current conditions a buying opportunity rather than a time to sell.

HONG KONG – Consensus Hong Kong’s first day did not parade into glory, but shuffled forward with the kind of anxious tremor that teeth-chatterers call progress. The city, in its grand modern dignity, spoke regulations like a stern magistrate granting mercy only after a long-standing debt of fear. Stablecoin licenses promised for next month, a framework for perpetual contracts, and a crypto economy that might finally stop pretending to be a mere carnival.

Hong Kong’s chief executive, the financial secretary, and the CEO of the Securities and Futures Commission laid out their priorities as if they were essays in penitent finance, hoping the public will believe in the numbers again. Regulation, licensing, guidance-the vocabulary of salvation, spoken as if markets themselves were souls needing a map.

Financial Secretary Paul Chan spoke of AI as one of the few trends maturing before our eyes: “As AI agents become capable of making and executing decisions independent of us, we may begin to see the early forms of what some call the machine economy, where AI agents can hold and transfer digital assets, pay for services and transact with one another onchain.”

Skybridge Capital’s Anthony Scaramucci clung to his forecast that bitcoin would reach $150,000, pointing to legislation under negotiation in the U.S. “I think once that legislation does pass, it’s gonna open a floodgate of activity in the money center banks in the United States,” he said. “If we’re just in the four-year cycle, then bitcoin is starting to reascend at the end of the year, starting in the fourth quarter.”

Consensys’ Joe Lubin argued Ethereum is anti-fragile, a sturdy shield for a decentralized foundation that could support further DeFi, enabling developers “to build, rearchitect the systems of the world essentially on sounder financial and trust foundations.” “DeFi is roughly as safe as traditional finance,” he claimed.

Nigel Feetham, Gibraltar’s minister for justice, trade and industry, noted that smaller jurisdictions regulate crypto to safeguard market safety and integrity. “We are jealous about guarding our reputation because one market failure, if I can put it that way, damages us all. Once you are licensed in a jurisdiction, you become a stakeholder, and therefore we have an obligation to look after all our stakeholders.”

Recent market action also drew the gaze of the speakers. Bitmine’s Tom Lee, facing nearly an $8 billion unrealized loss through ether holdings, urged people to seek opportunities rather than sell. “Gold is a meme,” said Jordi Alexander of Selini.

Consensus’ final day will feature panels on scaling Bitcoin, Ethereum and Solana, with a keynote by World Liberty Financial’s Zak Folkman and a fireside conversation with the Chairman of Pakistan’s Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority, Bilal Bin Saqib.

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2026-02-11 17:20