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HSBC CEO Noel Quinn says future tokenised products, like gold offering, will be ‘backed by something real’

  • Tokenisation has proved to be cheaper, more efficient and better than ‘the old-fashioned way of trading’, Noel Quinn says
  • HSBC will stay ‘away from crypto’, CEO adds

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Noel Quinn, CEO of HSBC Holdings, speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview on the sidelines of the HSBC Global Investment Summit in Hong Kong on April 8, 2024. Photo: Bloomberg
Mia Castagnone

Hong Kong’s largest commercial bank, HSBC, plans to expand its line-up of tokenised assets so its customers can enjoy the benefits of such digital products, but will make sure these offerings are grounded in reality, according to the bank’s CEO. It intends to steer away from volatile cryptocurrencies.

“Tokenisation is a more efficient trading mechanism and provides liquidity to that asset,” Noel Quinn said during a private media round table in Hong Kong last week. “In theory, you can tokenise anything. The key criteria for me is, is there substance behind the token? Has it got predictability? Does it exist?”

His comments came shortly after the launch of HSBC’s Gold Token, the first such retail product to be issued by a bank in Hong Kong, as the government pushes for the roll-out of more digital assets to the public.
Tokenised products can be recorded digitally on a blockchain, offered directly to end-investors, distributed by intermediaries, or traded. They have the potential to reduce operational costs and promote efficiency and transparency, according to the Securities and Futures Commission.

According to Quinn, tokenisation has shown to be cheaper, more efficient and better than “the old-fashioned way of trading”. There are more applications of tokenisation that the bank wants to explore.

“We continue to invest in our tokenisation product line-up. I think tokenisation of gold and bond issues are good [examples],” he said. “I’m very comfortable with the concept of tokenisation.”

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