RWA Summit Hong Kong 2026: The Definitive Bridge Between TradFi and On-Chain Realities

The RWA Summit Hong Kong has come to an end-an exciting event that has cemented the city's status as the world's leading centre for real asset tokenisation (RWA). These were two intense days when more than 700 carefully curated participants, 50+ distinguished speakers, and 80+ leading institutional investors gathered to map out the future of DePIN, stablecoins, and the move toward bringing TradFi on-chain.

Rather than revisiting whether tokenisation is viable, discussions focused on how it can be executed within credible legal, financial, and operational frameworks.

"RWA SUMMIT Hong Kong was not just another event for us; it was a place where real deals and business happened. We were proud to co-host the event and bring together potential partners, regulators, and market leaders. It was a great opportunity to present our bonds tokenisation and DeFi projects to both TradFi and digital assets players. I believe that the key result of any event is the real deals that follow. RWA SUMMIT is definitely this kind of event. No noise, no hype-only real expertise from speakers and a highly curated network," said Peter Kadish, Managing Director of LynxCap Investments and RWA SUMMIT Hong Kong co-host.

"The RWA Summit clearly showed that tokenisation has moved beyond theory into execution," said Scott Thiel, co-founder & CEO of Tokinvest. "Across panels on venture capital, IP tokenisation, and institutional adoption, the focus was on infrastructure, liquidity planning, and trusted market frameworks."

Gillian Wu, Founder and CEO of Mulana Investment Management, commented: "At the RWA Summit during Consensus Hong Kong, we explored how real-world assets are bringing wealth on-chain through greater efficiency, transparency, disintermediation, and fractionalised ownership. Tokenisation does not change the fundamental factors that influence value, and investors must carefully assess counterparty risk and liquidity. Although market fragmentation and structural differences between DeFi, exchanges, and traditional finance remain challenges, progress toward convergence is evident."

Day 1: Forging Regulatory Pathways and Institutional Momentum

The summit opened with remarks from Joseph Chan, Under Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury of the Hong Kong Government, who highlighted Hong Kong's regulatory direction and its ambition to provide clarity for tokenised financial products. The message was consistent throughout the day: regulatory structure is no longer an obstacle but a prerequisite for scale.

The first session explored global frameworks, featuring insights from Scott Thiel (Tokinvest), Julian Kwan (InvestaX), and Terence Ng (EX.IO), moderated by Peter Kadish (LynxCap). The takeaway: regulation has evolved from a barrier into a strategic advantage.

The summit also examined AI convergence. Alan Lau (Animoca Brands) and Geoff Kot (Standard Chartered) discussed how artificial intelligence is transforming the connection between traditional banking and digital asset ecosystems.

Another key discussion focused on banking giants moving on-chain. Bugra Celik (HSBC) and Giorgia Pellizzari (Hex Trust) highlighted the transition from proof-of-concept to full-scale institutional adoption, emphasising robust custody and security frameworks.

The day concluded with a forward-looking exchange between Nenter Chow of Bitmart and Sébastien Borget of The Sandbox, exploring how crypto-native ecosystems are incorporating RWAs and focusing on sustainable value creation.

"At the RWA Summit in Hong Kong, we discussed how blockchain is expanding from virtual real estate to collectible assets and user-generated content revenues being tokenised on-chain. The direction is clear: blockchain technology will become broadly adopted across gaming, digital assets, and the creator economy," said Sébastien Borget, co-founder of The Sandbox & SandChain.

The first day also featured industry leaders and innovators, including Cathal Donnellan (NexStox); Marcos Chow (HKT); Rocky Mui (Clifford Chance); Tom Wan (Imprint Capital Partners); Neil Tan (Tsunami Advisors & AI Association of Hong Kong); Phillip Pon (EMURGO); Andrei Grachev (DWF Labs); Musheer Ahmed (FinStep Asia); Jelena Zhang (Amber Premium); Jayendra Jog (Sei Labs); Nikita (Sachdev) Lord (Luna PR); Edwin Mata (Brickken); Preetam Rao (QuillAudits); and Leo Fan (Cysic).

Day 2: Envisioning Tomorrow's Wealth, IP, and Payment Innovations

The second day focused on applied use cases, examining how tokenisation is reshaping wealth management, intellectual property, and payment systems.

The day opened with a fireside chat featuring Sean McHugh, Senior Director - Market Assurance at VARA (Virtual Assets Regulatory Authority), focusing on regulatory clarity and market integrity.

Yat Siu (Animoca Brands) and Bowie Lau (MaGE Group) discussed IP tokenisation and its implications for platforms such as YouTube, Spotify, and Netflix, exploring direct monetisation and ownership models.

"A recurring theme in our discussion was that RWA is not about putting a single asset on-chain; it is about modernising financial infrastructure without breaking law, trust, or market structure," said Jeffrey Broer, Venture Advisor at Kohpy Ventures.

Wealth migration onto blockchain infrastructure was addressed by Ray Tam (Revo Digital Family Office) and Florian M. Spiegl (Evident Capital), who discussed onboarding professional investor wealth and emerging opportunities for retail investors.

The PayFi revolution was explored by Rita Liu (RD Technologies) and Evan Auyang (Animoca Brands), who examined stablecoins and payment finance in Asia.

The event concluded with a comparative discussion featuring Pauline Fan (InvestHK), Rachel Lee (Cyberport), and Irina Heaver (RWA Labs), assessing Hong Kong's regulatory agility.

The stage also welcomed investors and industry leaders including Noah Frankel (JSquare); Tobias Bauer (TBV); Calvin Ng (Plutus VC); Melody He (Spartan Group); Craig Dyer (HECTO); Pauli Speaks, Chief Business Development Officer at Cryptic; DiZien Low (Polygon Labs); Jacky Kong (Ava Labs); Sonia Shaw (OneAsset); Andrey Fedorov (STON.fi); Jackee Wong (Leadsourcing); Sudeep Mehta (STBL); and Lawrence Tsui (Fortinet).

Special thanks to the partners of RWA Summit, in particular Strategic Partner BTSE Enterprise Solutions and Partner STON.fi, for their invaluable support.

Industry Developments and Expansion

Beyond panel discussions, the summit served as a platform for major announcements. LynxCap introduced its DeFi platform connecting RWA yield strategies with structured liquidity environments. Ivan V. Ivanov (UVECON.VC) and Irina Heaver (RWA Labs) announced the launch of Dubai RWA Week 2026, signalling growing collaboration between Asian and Middle Eastern tokenisation hubs.

"RWA Summit Hong Kong brought together strong voices from both TradFi and digital assets," said Ivan V. Ivanov, founder of RWA Summit. "The discussions focused on execution, regulation, and real market structure grounded in practical cases rather than theory."

RWA Summit team
22 Des Voeux Road Central
Central, Hong Kong
Hong Kong

To sum it up, the RWA Summit Hong Kong 2026 has unequivocally demonstrated that the dialogue has advanced from "Is this feasible?" to "How swiftly can we expand?" By bridging TradFi's regulatory rigor with DeFi's tech stack, we're moving toward a financial system that is actually transparent and accessible, not just fast.

This release was published on openPR.