Standard Chartered becomes first bank distributor of HKDAP Hong Kong dollar stablecoin

Standard Chartered is taking its stablecoin strategy a step further, preparing to use a regulated Hong Kong dollar stablecoin in real financing activities, according to an Aug. 24 press release. The British multinational bank has been appointed an authorized distributor of HKDAP (HKD At Par), a Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin issued by Anchorpoint Financial. Institutional clients such as asset managers, multinationals and large corporates have typically relied on conventional settlement rails. With HKDAP, the bank says it can offer eligible clients a regulated stablecoin-based channel to move and settle Hong Kong dollar-denominated value. Mary Huen, Chief Executive Officer, Hong Kong and Greater China & North Asia at Standard Chartered, said the bank is "pleased to be the first bank distributor to provide eligible clients with secure access to the market-first Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin." Tokenized money market funds are expected to be among the first use cases, enabling investors to subscribe and settle fund units on-chain using digital Hong Kong dollars. The bank also points to intragroup settlement as a key application: multinationals could use HKDAP to transfer tokenized HKD value between subsidiaries around the clock, reducing dependence on bank cut-off times, intermediaries and lengthy reconciliation processes. Standard Chartered and Anchorpoint emphasized that HKDAP is not designed to remove foreign exchange, regulatory requirements or banking intermediaries in every transaction. Instead, it could simplify money movement and settlement where counterparties and jurisdictions support it. Anchorpoint Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder Dominic Maffei said the bank's international network and digital asset expertise should help broaden commercial and cross-border opportunities with HKDAP, strengthening ecosystem participation for the next phase of digital asset innovation. In broader market context, Bitcoin's Stablecoin Supply Ratio (SSR) stayed near 11.2–11.6 for most of August before jumping to about 14.2 recently following Bitcoin's price rally, based on CryptoQuant data. The move suggests Bitcoin's valuation has risen faster than stablecoin supply growth that could translate into incremental buying power. Even so, stablecoins posted $6.5 trillion in total transaction volume over the past 30 days, according to Visa on-chain analytics. Final summary: Standard Chartered plans to roll out tokenized money market funds as an early application. HKDAP is positioned to streamline settlement in supported scenarios, not to replace FX, regulation or banking intermediaries across all transactions.