Rwa is not something that every enterprise or industry can participate in the previous pilot in Hong Kong. Initially, capital is prioritized due to various high costs, especially compliance costs. Referring to dozens of previous cases, several pilot projects that participated in Hong Kong all required applications for relevant licenses. This means that projects participating in Hong Kong RWA need to apply for the relevant licenses. The Hong Kong government stipulates that issuers of RWS projects must hold a Type 9 license, custodians need a Type 13 license, and trading platforms require Type 1/7 licenses. The high costs of legal advice, license application fees, and the requirement of 5 million in paid-in capital have excluded countless small and medium-sized enterprises from the pilot.
In theory, RWA assets can interact globally on the blockchain, but in practice, due to issues of financial sovereignty, there will still be physical restrictions.
If financial assets cannot achieve global free interaction off-chain, it is also difficult to achieve global free interaction on-chain, still due to issues of financial sovereignty.
If Chinese RWA assets could flow and interact freely around the world, it would mean that China has completely opened up its financial industry chain, but in reality, this is very difficult, as it involves issues of financial sovereignty and security.
To summarize in three points:
1. High compliance costs for mainland Chinese enterprises conducting RWA business in Hong Kong.
2. Cross-border flow restrictions of RWA assets due to financial sovereignty; you cannot go out, and others cannot come in.
3. Real-world barriers and risks to China's financial openness.
RWA is a new tool for major powers to compete for asset pricing rights.
Why are the costs in Hong Kong so high? The real reason is to establish a firewall for a sovereign economic entity through high compliance costs, and the degree of openness of Chinese RWA will also match the national financial strategy.
If this trend continues, global economic integration can be realized on-chain at the technical level, but in geopolitical terms, it may become an on-chain local area network. There are no borders on the blockchain, but finance has sovereignty.