HashKey Group Chairman and CEO Xiao Feng kicked off the 2025 Hong Kong Web3 Pageant on Sunday with a keynote handle highlighting blockchain expertise’s transformative impression on world monetary infrastructure.
Chatting with an early morning crowd on the Hong Kong Conference and Exhibition Middle, Xiao described blockchain as “a brand new technology of monetary infrastructure” that basically modifications how monetary transactions are recorded, settled and ruled.
Industrial Revolution Requires Monetary Innovation
“Any industrial revolution should look ahead to a monetary revolution,” Xiao informed attendees on the four-day occasion hosted by his firm.
Xiao emphasised historic parallels between technological and monetary evolution: banking credit score supported the British Industrial Revolution, inventory markets enabled {the electrical} revolution in America, and enterprise capital fueled Silicon Valley’s info revolution.
“Cryptocurrency finance will turn into the core monetary innovation supporting the fourth industrial revolution.”
The chief highlighted key variations between conventional and blockchain-based finance, together with the shift from financial institution accounts to digital wallets and the transfer from batch settlement techniques to instantaneous transaction completion.
Regulatory Adjustments and Market Evolution
Xiao famous the importance of the U.S. Securities and Alternate Fee’s latest choice to not classify dollar-backed stablecoins as securities, suggesting this permits extra establishments to take part in financial creation processes.
HashKey Group Chairman and CEO Xiao Feng at Keynote speech of 2025 Hong Kong Web3 Pageant. Courtesy of Web3 Pageant
He additionally pointed to main inventory exchanges transferring towards 23-hour buying and selling cycles, in comparison with blockchain markets that function constantly.
“Conventional exchanges will ultimately must adapt to compete with cryptocurrency markets which have operated 24/7 since day one,” Xiao predicted.
Hong Kong’s Strategic Position
The occasion options a number of high-profile regulators, together with Paul Chan Mo-po, Monetary Secretary of the Hong Kong Authorities; Joseph H. L. Chan, Underneath Secretary for Monetary Companies and the Treasury; Christina Choi, Government Director of Funding Merchandise on the Securities and Futures Fee; and George Chou, Chief Fintech Officer of the Hong Kong Financial Authority.
Whereas mainland China maintains strict prohibitions on cryptocurrencies, analysts view Hong Kong’s supportive stance as a strategic testing floor for the expertise’s potential. This strategy successfully creates a regulatory respiratory house the place blockchain improvements can develop below managed circumstances, doubtlessly informing future insurance policies throughout the broader Chinese language economic system.
The Web3 Pageant continues by way of Wednesday with trade panels, demonstrations and networking occasions, bringing collectively blockchain builders, buyers and expertise lovers from all over the world.
