Golden Finance reported that Hong Kong Legislative Council member Li Wai-hung wrote an article in Ta Kung Pao focusing on exploring new market opportunities, addressing pain points in Hong Kong's financial services industry, and strengthening economic growth momentum. He specifically suggested welcoming the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) to relax investor restrictions on virtual asset trading and moderately allowing retail investors to participate.

He recommended that regulators, through enhanced investor education, gradually increase retail investor participation in trading more diverse virtual asset products (including increasing the variety of cryptocurrencies). He emphasized that they would receive greater regulatory protection by buying and selling on local compliant platforms, thereby promoting the development of Hong Kong's virtual asset market.

Meanwhile, the industry also hopes that the SFC will expedite the approval of asset management license upgrades and moderately relax regulations for intermediaries selling virtual asset ETFs (e.g., product disclosures and client knowledge assessments).

Li Wai-hung mentioned that the Hong Kong SAR government is about to initiate legislative proposals for regulating stablecoin issuers and over-the-counter (OTC) virtual asset exchanges. He expressed hope that the licensing approval process would be streamlined as much as possible, with reasonable thresholds, striking a balance between regulation and market development.