Standard Chartered-led Anchorpoint plans retail stablecoin as HSBC RedCoin launches

After HSBC RedCoin launched on Friday, Anchorpoint – the stablecoin-issuing joint venture led by Standard Chartered – said it plans to launch a retail product on a public blockchain, even as it takes a “prudent approach”.

“Our next major milestone is to [help] bring regulated digital money into everyday payments and commercial applications, while connecting traditional payment infrastructure with this emerging digital finance,” said Dominic Maffei, CEO of Anchorpoint.

“This is a public blockchain stablecoin, so applying this to retail, a lot of considerations need to be made.”

Anchorpoint’s commitment to serving its retail customers comes as HSBC just launched its Hong Kong dollar-backed HSBC RedCoin for the 3.3 million users of its PayMe app.

After releasing its institutional product in August, Anchorpoint previously said its retail product could arrive as early as the end of 2026, but did not confirm a launch date at a press conference on Friday.

“We believe it’s important to build the market out in a long-term, sustainable manner,” Maffei said, adding that “rushing something or doing something the wrong way does not make sense”.

Under its business-to-business-to-consumer model, Maffei said Anchorpoint was “building this open and inclusive ecosystem” in which “partners across the value chain” could work together.

“Market education is key,” Maffei added. Anchorpoint launched the Tokenised Money Adoption Programme last month “to support education, research and dialogue around tokenised money”, he said.

Highlighting stablecoins’ advantages, Maffei noted that “it’s 24/7, it’s instantaneous, it’s a reduction in cost, it’s programmability, interoperability, scalability.” He identified cross-border payments as a “key use case” for stablecoins in the payment ecosystem.

“The goal is to connect Hong Kong to other corridors,” Maffei said. Anchorpoint had previously worked in the United Arab Emirates and would share updates on other corridors as they came live, he added.

Stablecoins are digital tokens issued on a blockchain that can be transferred between parties within seconds, bypassing traditional clearing procedures. Unlike other cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, stablecoins are pegged to a traditional currency like the Hong Kong dollar or US dollar.

Tokenised financial products, including stablecoins, are expected to be a central topic at next month’s FinTech Week x StartmeupHK, co-hosted by multiple Hong Kong government authorities.