In an interview with the Hong Kong "Belt and Road Summit Forum", Chen Jiaqiang, Chairman of WeLab Bank and former Secretary for Financial Affairs and Treasury, said that Hong Kong's unique brand value enables it to play a unique platform role in the "Belt and Road"; the competitiveness of Hong Kong's financial technology companies is not only limited to technological advantages, but also lies in advanced services and compliance experience.

The core value of the Hong Kong platform: Hong Kong certification and Hong Kong endorsement

Chen Jiaqiang pointed out that the reason why Hong Kong is called a "super contact person" is not only because Hong Kong has efficient resource docking capabilities, but also because of Hong Kong's "technical verification capabilities" and "adaptation capabilities of international standards".

Chen Jiaqiang explained that when Chinese technology companies use the Hong Kong platform to enter overseas markets, their technical level and service quality have often been verified in the Hong Kong market, and products endorsed by Hong Kong credit will naturally be more easily recognized by the international market. In addition, Hong Kong's high-quality guarantee is not only reflected in the application level, but also includes compliance systems such as anti-money laundering and risk management. Hong Kong meets international standards. This kind of "Hong Kong certification" is an important trust basis for enterprises to go overseas. That is to say, companies that meet Hong Kong standards can effectively reduce their trust costs to enter overseas markets by going overseas through the Hong Kong platform.

Secondly, Hong Kong has its own "Hong Kong style" of "doing things down-to-earth" and this style is widely recognized by international partners. Unlike the development model of "concept first", Hong Kong's style is "step by step". This "stable" is accumulated over decades and has formed high-value international recognition. Chen Jiaqiang believes that the "pragmatic gene" makes Hong Kong more trustworthy in international cooperation, "this is an invisible advantage for companies to go global through Hong Kong."

Financial technology companies go overseas: Focus on the "localization" of business models and respond to "consistent principles and adjustments to details" in supervision

Chen Jiaqiang is currently the chairman of the board of directors of WeLab Bank. WeLab Bank is one of the eight digital banks in Hong Kong. According to the company's financial report, the company has achieved profitability in the first quarter of 2025. As of the end of 2024, WeLab Bank's customer deposits rose 1.2 times year-on-year to HK$6.87 billion, and its development speed is higher than the industry average.

Chen Jiaqiang introduced that WeLab is a pure Hong Kong local financial technology company. In addition to focusing on the local market, there are currently successful overseas cases. Three years ago, WeLab transformed it into a digital bank by acquiring Indonesia's "Jakarta Service Bank". Currently, this Indonesian digital bank has accumulated about 3 million customers. This overseas model not only avoids compliance barriers from scratch, but also accelerates its implementation with the help of the local foundation of the original institutions. "It took 1-2 years for Hong Kong to establish a banking system, and we completed it in just half a year in Indonesia. The core is to replicate Hong Kong's mature technical framework and risk management system. This also verifies the feasibility of "localization of Hong Kong experience."

Regarding the most complex cross-border regulatory issues in the financial field, Chen Jiaqiang said that the regulatory principles of Indonesia and Hong Kong are essentially consistent in protecting investors and anti-money laundering, but there are differences in culture and implementation details. WeLab’s response strategy mainly includes two points. The first is to form a localization team and understand the regulatory rules and cultural requirements; the second is to establish mutual trust in supervision, and through transparent communication, local regulators can understand the unique advantages of Hong Kong’s financial technology companies in compliance and technology.

Chen Jiaqiang also believes that choosing a trustworthy partner is very important for companies to go overseas, and the key to choosing lies in "resource complementarity". WeLab's partners in Indonesia include local leading companies and the original team of acquired banks. "The former provides local market resources and user base, while the latter is familiar with the local financial ecology. With WeLab's original digital technology in Hong Kong, the three form a closed loop." This combination of "local resources Hong Kong technology" has become an important support for enterprises to quickly increase in volume in overseas markets.

AI may lead financial technology services will be more humane and intelligent

In the later period of Chen Jiaqiang's tenure as Secretary for Financial Affairs and Treasury, he began to focus on promoting the development of Hong Kong's financial technology industry, including establishing a financial technology supervision team and promoting the implementation of the "financial technology management sandbox" of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority.

Chen Jiaqiang said that globally, the Hong Kong government was the first government authority to discover the potential of the financial technology industry. Looking back on the development of the Hong Kong financial technology industry over the past decade, the market performance is very prosperous. In addition to specific businesses such as digital banking and digital insurance, blockchain technology and AI technology are constantly maturing, and the progress of these new technologies will once again lead industry changes.

Chen Jiaqiang focused on the application potential of AI. "AI's transformation of financial technology mainly focuses on two core scenarios. The first is to reduce development costs and improve efficiency. "In the past, system design and process optimization required a lot of manual completion, now AI can significantly shorten the time; the second is to optimize customer experience. In scenarios such as cross-border payments and wealth management, AI can provide more intelligent services. For example, when users make cross-border transfers, AI may recommend adapted wealth management solutions based on users' risk preferences, making financial services closer to user needs. ”

Virtual Assets and Stablecoins: Regulatory must be ahead of schedule and maintain the bottom line of risk

Regarding the Stablecoin Regulations and the Virtual Assets Declaration 2.0 that are concerned by the market, Chen Jiaqiang pointed out that Hong Kong's supervision in the field of digital assets has been at the forefront of the world and the regulatory system is recognized by the world. Chen Jiaqiang believes that Hong Kong's regulatory model is forward-looking to a certain extent, that is, no matter what kind of technological iterations appear in the future, it can adapt to Hong Kong's regulatory framework.

"The main purpose of supervision is to protect investors and should be highly transparent." Chen Jiaqiang believes that the logic of supervision is to "let digital assets develop within a transparent and compliant framework, rather than "backdoor-like" disorderly expansion." The "balance of security and innovation" model can attract more investors to participate in the Hong Kong digital asset market.