We have updated our Operational Resilience timeline to include key recent developments from the UK, EU, Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia and international standard setting bodies.  Operational resilience is the ability to 'prevent, adapt, respond to, recover and learn from operational disruptions'. Read more

The Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) has proposed a number of sweeping enforcement-related reforms which would significantly enhance the SFC’s ability to obtain investor compensation orders against regulated persons who have committed wrongdoing. Read more

The Hong Kong Stock Exchange has recently published an information paper setting out amendments to the Listing Rules which dovetail with the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC)’s new code of conduct provisions for intermediaries carrying out bookbuilding and placing activities in equity and debt capital market transactions. Read more

In light of the increased prominence and popularity of virtual asset-related products and services, Hong Kong regulators have considered it appropriate in recent years to introduce reforms and provide additional guidance on VA-related activities. Read more

This year has seen significant developments in Hong Kong as detailed regulatory guidance has been issued to enable institutions to navigate the evolving crypto-asset landscape. Read more

Following the HKMA’s 21 April 2021 circular highlighting the additional guidance issued by the BCBS on 31 March 2021, namely the Principles for Operational Resilience and the Revised Principles for Sound Management of Operational Risk, the HKMA launched a consultation on 22 December 2021 on a new proposed Supervisory Policy Manual module OR-2 (Operational Resilience) and proposed amendments to existing SPM modules TM-G-2 (Business Continuity Planning) and OR-1 (Operational Risk Management) in order to align with the BCBS’s operational resilience guidance. Read more

In Tam Sze Leung & Ors v Commissioner of Police [2021] HKCFI 3118, a judicial review case, the Court of First Instance found the longstanding practice of the Hong Kong Police in effecting an informal freeze against bank accounts through the use of “letters of no consent” (LNCs) (the No Consent Regime) to be unconstitutional. Read more

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) has recently issued its Discussion Paper on Crypto-assets and Stablecoins, setting out the regulatory landscape globally and in other jurisdictions, as well as the current landscape in Hong Kong, and how it believes the Hong Kong regulatory framework should be expanded to cover payment-related stablecoins. Read more