Hong Kong needs to focus on three core areas in order to establish itself as an international securitization hub, namely (i) making available data and information about prior successful securitization transactions, (ii) creating a marketplace for professionals and (iii) implementing laws, regulations, tax rules and market infrastructure to support a robust securitization market, according to a joint report leading industry groups.

The Asia-Pacific Structured Finance Association (APSA), The Hong Kong Institute of Bankers (HKIB) and the Asian Academy of International Law (AAIL) jointly hosted a seminar on January 13 to examine how Hong Kong can enhance its role as an international securitization hub.

Discussing how Hong Kong’s strengths in finance and business can be leveraged to capture the opportunities in the Asian securitization market, the seminar is part of the annual International Financial Week being held in Hong Kong between January 13 and 17.

At the seminar, the three organizing parties jointly launched an industry report titled “Hong Kong – a Securitization Financing Hub for Infrastructure and Small and Medium Enterprises”, offering industry players specific recommendations on how to enhance the city’s financial ecosystem to deliver institutional investment capital through securitization to key sectors of the economy, such as infrastructure and small and medium enterprises (SMEs). The report discusses ways to capture the opportunities arising from various infrastructure projects across the region and to address the financing needs of SMEs.

It also stresses that the path towards establishing Hong Kong as a securitization financing hub requires the collaboration of multiple stakeholders including policy makers, regulators and professionals from the finance, legal, accounting, engineering, management and investment sectors.

Anthony Francis Neoh, special advisor to this industry report and the chairman of AAIL, says, “These securitization proposals will complete the last remaining elements which will make Hong Kong into the international hub for securitization of Asia, catering to international infrastructure projects and the securitization of small and medium enterprise financing in the Greater Bay Area. That will create a revolution on at least the same scale as that of H Shares, if not more.”