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When Singapore’s central bank released its tokenisation guidelines, it signalled something rare in global financial regulation: confidence.
“If your project falls within these case studies, there is no need to double check with them. Just go ahead,” said Yingyu Wang, partner at Simmons & Simmons, who has been advising digital asset and fintech clients since 2017.
Tokenisation has moved from exploratory pilots to a legally recognised, operationally supported component of capital markets. And the message from the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) was clear: the rails are ready, the guardrails are in place, and the next phase belongs to institutions.
In an in-depth interview with Deeptech Times, Wang unpacked not only Singapore’s emergence as an APAC regulatory anchor, but also the blind spots, infrastructure gaps and geopolitical shifts shaping digital assets, from tokenised funds and stablecoins to AI-powered finance.
Singapore’s legal infrastructure: Quietly mature, increasingly tested
Tokenisation in Singapore is not a regulatory revolution. It is an evolution of long-standing principles. “It has always been same risk, same principles,” Wang noted. Capital market products, whether traditional or tokenised, still fall under the Securities and Futures Act. Payment assets still align with the Payment Services Act.
But the practice of tokenisation is what has changed dramatically.
The rollout of tokenised money market funds signals that tokenisation is no longer an experiment. It is a distribution strategy, a liquidity strategy, and increasingly, a mainstream wealth product.
This maturity, Wang emphasised, is not equally distributed across APAC. Interest from regional markets such as Malaysia often comes with one purpose: to migrate projects into Singapore because there is no suitable framework back home.
Hong Kong, she acknowledged, is the exception. Its rapid expansion of tokenised bond issuances has created strong momentum in institutional financial markets. Japan also has a robust legal foundation although operational uptake is less clear.
The real bottleneck isn’t regulation
When asked about the biggest blind spots hindering institutional adoption, Wang did not point to legal gaps but practical ones.
Harmonisation takes time and cross-border alignment cannot be rushed. “Every regulator needs time to get comfortable,” Wang said. Firms rolling out multi-market products face unpredictable regulatory readiness across APAC. Harmonisation is less a legal exercise and more an endurance test.
Interoperability is a structural challenge. The biggest hurdle is technological, not legal. Different networks, different custodial standards, and different distribution infrastructures make cross-border trading of tokenised assets difficult. A bank in one market might be licensed but not technologically equipped to custody or distribute tokenised securities. Liquidity suffers, even if the law permits it.
Even where rules allow tokenisation, the absence of regulated intermediaries (brokers, custodians and advisors) creates bottlenecks. Without ecosystem readiness, tokenised assets cannot flow.
Stablecoin rules: Japan and Singapore lead with pragmatic flexibility
Wang believes Japan and Singapore have emerged as the most balanced jurisdictions for stablecoin oversight, blending consumer protection with competitiveness.
Japan recognises tokenised deposits, e-money and trust-based instruments (traditional products in digital wrappers) while leaving non-asset-backed stablecoins under crypto-asset rules.
Singapore follows a similar pattern: anyone can issue a stablecoin, but intermediaries are regulated. MAS’s upcoming “regulated stablecoin label” will introduce more rigorous frameworks for institutionally oriented stablecoins, without outlawing the broader crypto ecosystem.
This dual-tier structure creates variety across risk appetites. “Every product serves a different market,” Wang noted. Retail users, institutions and DeFi-native players can pick what aligns with their tolerance.
Hong Kong, by contrast, has adopted a narrower definition focused on strict reserve-backed models. Effective, perhaps, but less flexible.
Institutional confidence: The Trump effect, ETFs and AML maturity
One of Wang’s most surprising observations was geopolitical: the single biggest shift driving institutional confidence in digital assets, she said, was the election of Donald Trump.
After years of SEC-driven enforcement ambiguity, the U.S. policy turn has given global institutions cover to re-engage in crypto.
Two other catalysts are driving institutional comfort.
From Bitcoin and Ethereum ETFs to structured yield products built off tokenised MMFs, creativity around cryptocurrency assets is reshaping mainstream wealth management.
The gradual rollout of travel rule compliance, AML/CFT controls and licensing frameworks across custodians, brokers, crypto exchanges, funds and market makers has professionalised the entire value chain.
For banks, the barrier has never been legal but reputational and prudential. Basel’s proposed reserve requirements for crypto exposure remain a key concern, especially in Hong Kong. Singapore’s decision not to implement these rules until at least 2027 has avoided premature jurisdictional arbitrage.
AI in finance: Regulate through practice, not new laws
Singapore’s approach to AI governance mirrors its approach to tokenisation: pragmatic, iterative, and grounded in existing laws.
The MAS-led Project MindForge and its forthcoming multi-part AI governance handbook do not introduce new legislation. Instead, they layer transparency, accountability, risk management and senior management responsibility onto existing regimes such as AML, best execution and consumer protection.
“We don’t need AI-specific laws,” Wang argued. “Existing frameworks are tech-agnostic. What matters is practical implementation.”
Her earliest AI-related advisory work was a perfect example: helping a proprietary trading firm prevent traders from recreating proprietary algorithms purely from memory after job-hopping. In markets without database rights (like Singapore), the solution wasn’t copyright. It was contractual design.
AI forces organisations to rethink ownership and licensing not through sweeping legal reforms, but through carefully crafted agreements that define data rights, model rights and usage limitations.
What policymakers must prioritise: Speed, liquidity and cyber resilience
Looking ahead, Wang identified three priorities that will determine APAC’s leadership in digital assets:
1. Introduce regulations quickly
Digital assets are inherently cross-border. Without timely regulation, markets cannot interoperate and institutional investors will hesitate.
2. Solve liquidity through cross-border market access
Wang pointed to Hong Kong’s bold decision to allow licensed entities to share order books with overseas affiliates. Interoperability and liquidity go hand-in-hand. Without them, tokenised markets stagnate.
3. Strengthen cybersecurity and fraud prevention
The rise of tokenised finance increases the attack surface. In an era of scams, hacks and ransomware, consumer protection is no longer optional infrastructure. It is existential.
Pilot projects, such as the tri-lateral tokenisation tests between Thailand, Singapore and the UK, are essential. They build trust not through theory but through transaction-level testing.
A region learning, diverging and converging all at once
APAC is not a monolith. Singapore and Hong Kong lead in regulatory maturity. Japan and Thailand offer stability. Korea and Vietnam are drafting new laws. Malaysia is in earlier phases. But as Wang highlighted, there are enough legislative examples out there for policymakers to learn from.
And in the U.S., according to Wang, regulatory dynamics are highly political. The shift from a hostile SEC posture to a pro-crypto federal stance shows how quickly global sentiment can turn and how exposed the industry is to political cycles.
Regulation as the next innovation frontier
For all the technical complexity of tokenisation, Wang’s perspective reveals a deeper truth: the future of digital assets in APAC will be shaped not only by code, capital or decentralisation but by regulatory coordination executed at the speed of innovation.
Singapore’s guidelines show what is possible when trust, clarity and pragmatism merge. The next chapter of APAC’s digital asset growth will depend on whether neighbouring jurisdictions can keep pace, and whether cross-border bridges are built fast enough to carry the weight of institutional capital.
