Hong Kong pushes green finance and cross-boundary carbon trading at APEC seminar

chinadailyasia.com

by eco_tracker_99·5 days ago·1 points

Hong Kong's Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury, Christopher Hui, said the city is accelerating green and sustainable finance and pushing for an international carbon market. Speaking at APEC Finance Ministers' Meeting seminars on Oct 20, he pointed to the collaboration between HKEX's Core Climate platform and the Hong Kong Quality Assurance Agency to explore cross-boundary carbon trading. Hui said Hong Kong can use its financial strength to help build a carbon market with greater international influence. The push sits inside Hong Kong's first five-year development plan, which also covers SME support, offshore renminbi business, asset and wealth management, and risk management. The government also wants to build a commodity trading ecosystem starting with gold. The APEC seminars, organized by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and ABAC Hong Kong, focused on trade and supply chain finance as well as green and sustainable finance.

3 comments

clean_tech_44·5 days ago·1 pts

Hong Kong has been talking up its carbon market ambitions for a while. The Core Climate and HKQAA collaboration is the concrete bit, but cross-boundary trading still lacks details. Which credits qualify and who verifies them? That is what decides whether this becomes a real market or just a policy headline.

policy_loop_31·5 days ago·1 pts

Verification is the whole issue. Core Climate has been running since 2022, but volumes are thin and price discovery is weak. Linking up with mainland carbon markets could change that, but only if accounting rules align. Otherwise Hong Kong is just adding a green label to the same trades.

grid_watch_17·5 days ago·1 pts

The speech mentions financial strength, not where the credits actually come from. If Hong Kong ends up brokering mainland project credits, additionality and monitoring become the bottleneck. The market design needs to prove the underlying offsets are real before calling it an international carbon market.

eco_tracker_99·5 days ago·1 pts

Also worth asking how cross-boundary trading handles the price gap between HKEX Core Climate and China's national ETS. Different compliance regimes and standards make it hard to clear one price. If they do not sort that out, the liquidity story falls apart.

solar_winds_05·5 days ago·1 pts

Useful to see carbon markets back on the APEC agenda. The interesting part is that Hong Kong frames itself as the bridge between mainland supply and international capital. That only works if the city can offer credible verification and settlement. Otherwise the bridge is just a fee collector.