# TOKEN2049 - The Asian Tigers: Are They Still Roaring?

- Channel: [TOKEN2049](https://streameth.org/token2049)
- Date: 2019-10-09
- Watch: https://streameth.org/watch/yt-AlNeEz_VVgY
- YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AlNeEz_VVgY

## Transcript

my name is a Congo and the tech editor at the South China Morning Post for those of you who may not be from Hong Kong the sub China Morning Post was founded in 1903 in the last years of the Qing Dynasty and like many other industries our newspaper is undergoing a digital journey of its own if you have not read us I hope that you will enjoy some feedback so today we are gathered to talk about this topic the Asian Tigers are they still roaring it's a pretty broad topic but before we get into it maybe I ask our guests to introduce themselves in the era of interest for those of us who have not met them sure we'd love to so I'm Herbie I'm a partner at t3 laughs - Teresa multi-family office facing Hong Kong so and San Francisco we kinda you know we're more dedicated to poaching and emerging market opportunities globally good morning I'm ray thanks for coming and pleased to be on this panel with fellow panelists I'm with the new capital which is named after the founder of our fun Peter do we are a venture capital firm based out of Singapore and we focus exclusively on projects that's venture in the distributed ledger technologies we've been investing this in this industry across all the crypto asset classes in the past six years and we seek to promote the sustainable growth of the industry with attributes behind our capital you see Vincent they found our baby capital in the we ran away I wanna focus on the capital investment and repassing was in some certain osmond of equity and also soft before and recently we are more focus on the you master leasing the second market for the training and an attractive block trade on the on the all points okay thanks for that Asian Tigers so this is a term betting I haven't heard for for a while now it was very popular you know maybe in the 90s when while you refers to the for rapidly industrializing economies Hong Kong Singapore Korea and Taiwan in recent years you know especially when you know China enter the WTO with the rapid you know economic growth we hear the term Asian Tigers less and less because there really is just one dragon right so so this topic is timely in a sense that you know with Hong Kong and Singapore they are global financial centres right now career and Taiwan every one smartphone in a pocket probably contains some component or IP because of Samsung and you know Foxconn the question really is in the blockchain economy of the future with a lot of advances in technology in AI Internet of Things you know that threatened to change the way we work live and play do this for economies to have relevance and can they really just maintain you know there are their leadership in the respective fields it is it is great we have this panel because I all three of my guests have experience of working and living in you know in these places maybe Vincent I'll start with you you know you you are now based mostly in Beijing how does how do the Asian Tigers look to you from the vantage point of Beijing China Alaska the world how does how the Asian Tigers looked to you you know being based in Beijing China I think it's okay and especially its kind of from I live in China in parallel ciao ciao ciao around in master domination adjusted Cheerilee in the tiger conscience especially in the Singapore and Hong Kong and career I think I live in where I think that's is not a problem for for me for myself where are the most opportunities that you're seeing in China in your I mean in your field you know a forum and I solicit depend depend on and for my in the especially energy market I think the the the crypto market became really come back or really become well hot to the end up to the 2007 he 17 in that time the career mechanic a lot and lately last year in the East was rockin hot for over four wire and but recently in a career market come back again that waiter investors was the the tell you mister is the passion come back again in a big companies and so in a corner kind of companies have kind of tried to try to touch the touches of crypto a little bit so so for this kind of Mac rising in the Asian market and I think Korea hip what up trees recently and also a Singapore in the in Hong Kong I think is very flexible for the decoration and and I seen a lot of especially the security sto opportunities will come from the Hong Kong Singapore I think right now the the stable coins requestor coins and a kind of record secure offering welcome I come out I'm not sure some cement to a miracle waiver boilin finished dice English is just the beginning I'm not sure way to be waiting to come out prepare for us but for us in before we are very clear serve in the US women in early stage stage in the you know angel investor and also their soft investment but right now for us and we are waiting for the market come come hot and we're champion in the latter stage with the higher hydration and also with a with the mom made sure that the team this is our strategy right now also the obtain we fighting will come back to career later because I think it's the fact that a lot of people interested in but hobby you're based in Hong Kong now right yes I'm basing I'm actually I just live in Hong Kong and I spent like one poster time in Hong Kong home for saying Korea on hosting United States my trusted friend New York and sometimes you know just as well right and already lives in Singapore so there's always this Hong Kong Singapore thing going on you know whether it's an especially in financial regulation you know it is a stock market bond issuance and all that okay in the in the crypto space or anything blockchain Vincent mentioned regulation and how Hong Kong is Singapore quite flexible I mean how do you see the regulatory of you know environments in these two places and how does that help or not help your businesses so I was thinking Hong Kong is not as flexible on the regulation side was Singapore so for example say you know like very recently a lot of people are high paying to you know they're saying stand box the the new regulation on the exchanges in Hong Kong but indeed it's actually very tough like changes to be actually regulated and after the regulation to be properly operated and you know like we think within the sandbox policy like if it's actually being executed the modern training will be prohibited which means one of the largest margin trading exchange in Hong Kong might be in very dangerous situation and in the meantime in Hawaii Singapore like very recently the investment arm of tamasic and Singapore Stock Exchange they invested in security token offering platform call I stocks and it's gonna be launching very soon I think early next year and it will be offering license in q3 this year yeah I think he'll be basically what I wanted to say but if you think about it it's it's very challenging for the regulators because they're dealing with the exponential rate of changes while still trying to figure out how to protect the interest of the investors how to maintain the market integrity but I think most jurisdiction you know the regulators have have shown you know have taken on this challenge very well demonstrated by the level of engagement with the industry players as well as the well thought approaches that are taken in Singapore the regulatory tonality has always been rules and regulations - not from wrong innovation and the as carbon mentioning Hong Kong Singapore has a sandbox for fast-track approval as well so I think to me both regulators in you know in Hong Kong Singapore they understand and respect free market because they know that free market best determines the true value of an innovation and therefore they're not rushing in to put a leash on the innovation and work rather you know on a high level just monitoring how things will go and then follow up with the steps so yeah and also I think towards the latter part of this year in Singapore there will be some level of regulatory clarity as a starter there is a payment services bill which groups all these you know Bitcoin Astrium transactions payment under under this bill so I think all this clarity will will will be very helpful for these industry to move forward doesn't matter to you that to build a business in an established financial center like like Singapore or Hong Kong or you know a place where maybe the regulation isn't as tight you know we've seen quite a lot I mean you read the news I'm no expert but if you read the news alter and you know some of the other places seem to have you know you see them hit - all the time you know but why do you choose to base yourself you know out of Hong Kong and Singapore - the fact that they have an established capital base that doesn't help I mean Hong Kong is a very good harbour see you know like just like talking 2049 a lot of people like they can visit very easily but in any meaning in the meanwhile like China or some other countries it's often times you require visa or you know and I think it's and also in the same time Hong Kong is very centralized for for its capital and the people in there so think it's a good place to stay I think it's a fund and it's slightly and for us like locating anywhere is it's fine the the main consideration is taxing application but I think for a lot of you know crypto projects they still choose to register their foundations in Singapore instead of other optional entities because you don't want to deal with too many variables especially you're talking about new technology so you want the kind of you know robustness in the financial system in the legal framework so that you're shielded against you know additional uncertainties and also I think for for investors and other players you know if if we see this project register allocated in such a mature economy I think that gives us some level of comfort as well and plus the is these financial centers they they are the harps of capital of talents and of all these activities so I think that's that's probably explains why all of us cluster in these places I find it interesting that Asian Tigers was a term that was popular for you know from the 60s - maybe the 90s right and then there was also a time when China was still closed to the outside world when China started to open up join the WTO and 2001 you see that China really came up and the Asian Tigers kind of found their father level I would say right so China now probably is not as friendly I supposed to - Krypto when do you see China finally embracing this and when that does happen what will happen to the Asian Tigers and we see another round of the same thing from manufacturing but now you can give me the crypto yes I'm not sure this discussion canals and and for us I think we can adjust a measurement even I live in China Beijing but this is also has a nice tinkle scene and these days I was open a charge of openness to create account in a secret account in the account opening ask me and where I live in a way are my company I am our companies in kemmerlin and he asked right now he did not open a can ask me why I live in China beating and I can lock a company in the canal and so as right now we are quit we have a in fact our the office the we have a office in a car in New York and we have people in Singapore in there but but you asked me when Chang camera opened see this is a question not not I can answer in there but we always can find at the opportunities in this market and I think you might be my upon a realizing at the earlier the Eastern investor in the market that were totally different I don't know but but we which you find it to find the opportunity to how to make money this is a busy the key in every market in proxying or other industries but I only I only know kept talking this is about this is this is a lemur Fox any views on China when you open up you defer that if I open up well I mean you know the thing is like I said Singapore and Hong Kong probably come leave impact in a way of regulation and being you know friendly and all that and mainland China probably not as much do you think that and and by extension you know Singapore Hong Kong in a way is playing a big charge right because you know China is so huge as we have seen in the manufacturing age you know they have they have this vast pool so my question really is you know even when China does embrace crypto at the same level you know what would happen to the Asian Tigers well if you look at the number of patents filed in the blockchain industry China accounts for 40 to 43 percent of the total patents find in the past year and also if you look at the documents relief released by the government's you know I think at the end of 2016 the State Department not a state state council has already written blockchain technology international level development strategy and then 22 provinces have issued documents to promote the developments of the do technology so I think from that perspective and China is like really ahead of the curve in in terms of you know the technology itself the the area that it's like closed up is more like you know speculative activities or there's a crypto trading and I think from the regulatory perspective is perfectly understandable but that said I do I do agree with you that Singapore and Hong Kong stand to benefit in the past few years because all these activities were pushed out of China you have exchanged set up in Singapore miners moved to Hong Kong definitely I think this is this is Singapore and Hong Kong and other Asian Tigers chance to play in this catch-up game don't you need a bit of the speculative activity to make things interesting you know make people excited with offer animal spirits so to speak yeah I think it's because right now attention is very valuable and speculation draws attention to this this market if without this kind of level of attention we wouldn't experience the velocity of you know technology advancements we don't we wouldn't have so many developers rushing into contributing to the development of technology so I think from that perspective yeah it has its positive aspects but if you look at the entire financial system stability I think that's the top concern for regulators you've been very quiet no I'm just I was just thinking because it's very interesting opportunity it's very interesting question that you see actually actually Korean is actually quite similar with China you know we both have kept of control you know we both have a mobile retail retail traders in the decrypted market you talk about career I mean like both China and Korea at the same time the very funny things that you actually see Korea government right now mobile app to blockchain crypto right now but the things that I was thinking because a China like internally it has much more problems to deal with so but at the same time Korea due to the lack of the economic growth lack of the catalyst for economic growth the government somehow right now is looking for the blockchain this rate to help boost is employment rate and you know to trying to find a new catalyst for its internal economic growth so it's very funny saying that you know I even I'm like I have zero blotting Korea but uh like I'm also like you know like the external cause advisor for the blockchain industry for the blocking regulation in there yeah and we see the Korean government is right now legalizing the exchange business and also down the road a lot of secure token related stuff in there in some sort of talent I mean where do you see that the biggest talent pools in Asia for your for your business yeah so ten for talent cash market like I said like right now you can keep your body right sure in China yeah China have the most talented and hardworking people right yeah I think right now that the the most I came in for was supported by the by the by the program the entire right now more PD and also other guys of each market a lot if it's medicinal China has the most number of people here it okay so I mean that means you just have to be in China don't you I mean even even if you're not really based there you do need R&D you need to get involved there just because the talent is there yeah okay let's let's change our trig a little bit maybe just tell me about the most interesting project or opportunity that you're working on or looking at because I'm sure the audience would be interested as well yeah sure I would start with this topic so right now cuz you know like the the crypto market like the crypto trading is getting cooling down so right now we're more you know shifting on the on the on the venture investment in emerging market especially we see some activities on the financial services side financial services as saying you know for the crypto lending and payment and remittance services on top of our chain so for example say there's a company in Philippine called coin store pH which is invested by nez perce and it's recently acquired by Kojak and the company you know like you see like often times it's very very Hong Kong we see a lot of like a Filipino worker but they had they have very hard time wiring money back to their homeland and oftentimes the fees varies from 5% to even 15% for that for exchange transaction but a console console page they actually they lower the feet to 3% and right now the volume of the remittance each month is over 300 million u.s. which is pretty decent business and that's how we see in like the blocking actually contribute and be value add to the to the people and to the society yeah and we also you know like tracking the similar opportunity see Mexico and Brazil as well yeah I wouldn't leave some time for you know questions from the audience if any about you know recent sure so traditionally our fund focus is on two tracks on a IOT we invested in a lot of IOT projects from very base layer that's you know sort of like building new Ethernet kind of projects like starting of network all the way up to the micro payments in the IOT industry and then the second track of our focus is financial empowerment very much similar to what Herbie just mentioned some you know Remington's projects payment projects that's focused exclusively in the less developed markets so I think this year as I mentioned that probably market not much going on and which if they are focused more towards the post investment management and trying to do some hand Holdings with with our portfolios and see what what kind of value we can add to them first first I am Not sure First Avenue says if you if in the important quickest place for long time icing you can you can see a trend is that this can distribute a lot of things but it's just the beginning from happen over there to waste to waste to waste I can make sense is one way is just a Ryan just a mention is a for the attention I think everyone can see the chain before we focus on technology and so-called distributed distribute this period the latest technology and just being a team and very slow movement for the government very so but right now I think signalized say another team to Tirupathi rise that technology and to them market promotion is very hot I think I think you know with homage what I'm saying not just like like pants were pouring up it in its kind of market and they they let you have the most attention my drive not attention in effect they can make explore their port for the father for everything this is this is this is this is the opportunities I this is when optimizing this is one way another way is another ways Union who to use approach and to do the real penis can can really make a real kid flawed but it's a little hard right now in but in a long time I think it's make sense I'm almost more like likely part in it only do that cheering ready maybe do the asset management maybe do they do the kind of pivot Eve and some kind of very nice I listed my this is this is my point I did not specific for the for the project and but I'm more focus on a tool to Sarah we're in another another ponies is is this is just just as I was there in a star in a it's very tenuous input money in that in well beginning teams and as for analyzing it's okay right now you know and there's tariffs receive them early similar much in more money they needed in betting on it they did not have a cash management and enough makes a lot of investors especially with retail investors where they suffer from the market blackbriar I can see the future you know crypto in it's a time for their serious investors to find the right approach to enter the market for the custody for the simple some some some people will come from the a regular size but the rest I come from the Sigma a team and with a digitizer technology nice is my point yeah thank you any serious investors for one are some questions or panelist I think we have time for a couple so in 2017 and 2018 it seems like I CEOs were really the the rage for institutional investors because that's where most of the about you came from starting in 2018 everyone was going for protocols in 2019 what do you see are the new hot trends for investors so you know like for our fund strategy right now we see so I can tell like some someone to make focus for fall and for myself right now so basic on the financing from financial services and some and some of the you know like the combination with emerging market opportunity so financially in France for you know like the custodian custody custody services custom bank and on chain data and analytics enter fraudulent and financial service has just mentioned last earlier so like the steel like if changes exchange business but some of the exchange business in more hyperinflation countries like Turkey like Argentina like Mexico and etc and what else and also some the peer-to-peer OTC in some developed countries as well you see actually you know like paxville and local bitcoins there are actually huge local becomes a more active in Latin America and in the meantime pack soy is more active in Africa and those kind of the project and there are actually quite life-saving to the local people yeah I I can I can see I shot him opportunity in the valley for the flooding West's as I seen in Boston right now it's West Pacific it is right now it is changes the same right exchanges to do the patina is fine reason this is a sudden Monica opportunities in the next icing at least for swimmer's I just joking always joking the yellow three years because 2017 2018 if you can if you only end up you know in the December but without 17 and at the January and February in a 2018 you feel only you must instruments and you clear position you know at the end of February I thinking you can make a lot of money kind of period I you I think at least I'm not sure I'm not sure it will become a kind of opportunities or not but I usually be a big opportunity for everyone in space in a analysis gesture I I mentioned it's kind of per market that it is hard of a mecca money so that you have attention is very important every every project if you if the if the team is still have a lot of money in cash have a have a cool process in that you haven't helped reputation in the market inactive of other form of emotion and if they can if they did not have a legal problem for the father for the IE oh I see I think is opportunity for the following myself what was for the return investment in a father for the traditional venture taking the profound and and also for exchanges I think we all the Kenya follow up I think in the next wave every project if you keep on your list in stay with you I you yes so this is my list my point this is this is this is also I see the originally the option Hill in a long time I don't know I'm not sure I didn't see you long term I suggest have compared to the coins will have the fundamental as just a super coin and some of the coins of all kinds applied a convention here's I already explore my openings or the hot Hawaii the long-term opportunities if you if you see this kind of chain will be a beginning you can find some you can buy some the panel the other or the fundamental clients the other maybe you can make more money than to jump in there such a project is in my part I second to Vincennes last point and I think the secondary market will be very interesting this year because you know the builders it's I think 29th will be a year for pewters and builders will distinguish themselves from others and on the secondary market the existing capital and in the new capital they will firstly of course bought a Bitcoin and flat to the blue chips so I think there will be a lot of opportunities there if you look at last year a very much hyped market is really bad for innovation and this year because it's getting you know more calm we see a lot of hard work happening and we see a lot of you know blockbusters coming up this year the I think cosmos is online today and then in a few months time we'll be having polka dot so all these you know large projects that came clean to be solving some of the problems plaguing the industry will show if they're able to bring back some of the confidence back to the to the market so thank you very much I think that's all the time we have for today