Anchorpoint's Retail Stablecoin Has No Date: What It Means for Sellers

The Anchorpoint stablecoin has no retail launch date. What U.S. sellers with Hong Kong buyers or suppliers should do now, and what to ask their processor.

Adrian ReyesSenior Payments & Fintech Editor

October 27, 2026 · 8 min read

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On this page 6 sections

What Anchorpoint Said, and Why Reports Disagree on Timing
How the Anchorpoint Stablecoin Differs From HSBC's RedCoin Rollout
Why Bank-Issued Stablecoins Matter for Cross-Border Payments
What This Means for U.S. Merchants With Hong Kong Buyers or Suppliers
Questions to Ask Your Processor About Stablecoin Settlement
What to Do Now: Watch, Don't Rebuild Your Checkout Yet

As of Oct. 27, 2026, the retail version of the Anchorpoint stablecoin has no launch date. Anchorpoint is the Hong Kong venture of Standard Chartered, Animoca Brands and HKT, and it already issues a Hong Kong dollar token called HKDAP to institutions. At a press conference, CEO Dominic Maffei declined to repeat the venture's earlier target of retail access as early as the end of 2026. If you're a U.S. seller with Hong Kong customers or suppliers, don't change your checkout or payout setup this quarter because of it.

The timing stands out because rival HSBC launched its own Hong Kong dollar stablecoin, RedCoin, to PayMe users the same day. Put the two side by side and you can see that bank-issued stablecoins are arriving in stages. Institutions get them first. Retail users come next, but only inside one bank's own app. Tokens that move freely between banks, wallets and borders come later, if at all. That last stage is the one that would matter to a U.S. merchant, and nobody has given it a date.

What Anchorpoint Said, and Why Reports Disagree on Timing

The South China Morning Post broke Maffei's comments, and Cointelegraph's Oct. 26 report and other outlets picked them up. Maffei said Anchorpoint still plans to offer HKDAP to retail users on a public blockchain, but it will take a prudent approach. He said the goal is to build the market "in a long-term, sustainable manner," and that rushing a launch does not make sense.

Anchorpoint's institutional product has been running since August. A KuCoin summary of the Chinese-language outlet Jinse Finance says the HKDAP stablecoin is pegged one-to-one to the Hong Kong dollar. It has run in beta on Ethereum for qualified businesses and professional investors. When retail access comes, it will go through licensed distributors rather than directly from Anchorpoint, a business-to-business-to-consumer model.

The coverage disagreed on two points. Both are worth knowing before you read the next headline on this:

The date of the press conference. Cointelegraph and TokenPost place it on Friday, Oct. 23, the day HSBC launched RedCoin. The Jinse-based summary dates it Oct. 26, which is when most English-language stories ran.
What was said about year-end. One news aggregator's headline said Anchorpoint "confirmed" a retail launch before year-end. Cointelegraph, citing the SCMP, reported the opposite: Maffei declined to confirm that timing. Bloomingbit and TokenPost agree with Cointelegraph.

The lesson for merchants is simple. If secondary reports disagree about whether a launch date was confirmed, treat the date as unconfirmed until the issuer or regulator puts it in writing.

How the Anchorpoint Stablecoin Differs From HSBC's RedCoin Rollout

The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA), the city's banking regulator, granted its first stablecoin issuer licenses on April 10, 2026. HSBC and Anchorpoint Financial got theirs the same day, according to CoinMarketCap. Since then, the two have taken very different routes to retail customers.

	HSBC RedCoin (RCHKD)	Anchorpoint HKDAP
Backers	HSBC	Standard Chartered Hong Kong, Animoca Brands, HKT
Status as of Oct. 27, 2026	Phased retail rollout began Oct. 23	Institutional beta since August; no retail date
Who can use it	More than 3.3 million eligible PayMe users	Qualified businesses and professional investors
Where it runs	Inside PayMe and HSBC's Hong Kong mobile banking app	Ethereum, a public blockchain
First uses	Person-to-person transfers; payments at 100,000+ PayMe merchants	Institutional use cases; retail through licensed distributors later
Next stated step	Added to HSBC's banking app by end of 2026, with a tokenized money market fund from HK$100	None announced

HSBC built a walled garden. The SCMP reports that RedCoin is available only through PayMe and HSBC's Hong Kong banking app, and The Cryptonomist notes it isn't on crypto exchanges. HSBC controls the wallet and the merchant network, and its own unit, HSBC Digital Assets Custody, holds the reserves. That lets the bank turn users on in phases and keep its financial-crime controls inside its own systems.

Anchorpoint chose the harder route: a public chain, with retail distribution handed to licensed third parties. Maffei said a public-blockchain stablecoin raises many more issues once retail users are involved. Here is our reading, which is an inference and not something Anchorpoint has said: more parties have to be ready before launch, including distributors, their wallets and their compliance teams. That is a plausible reason no one will commit to a date.

Why Bank-Issued Stablecoins Matter for Cross-Border Payments

A bank-issued stablecoin is a digital token that a licensed issuer promises to redeem one-for-one for a regular currency. Both Hong Kong licenses were granted under the city's Stablecoins Ordinance, which took effect in August 2025.

The appeal for cross-border payments is speed and hours. A token can settle on a blockchain in minutes, at any time of day. A wire, by contrast, has to beat bank cut-off times and pass through a chain of correspondent banks. That same idea drives the card networks' projects, which we covered in Mastercard's Global Money Platform and how stablecoins reach your processor.

For a U.S. seller, the Hong Kong tokens have three limits today:

They're denominated in Hong Kong dollars. If you price and bank in U.S. dollars, the money still has to be converted somewhere, and someone sets that rate and spread.
The retail token that exists is closed-loop. RedCoin moves between PayMe users and PayMe merchants. It has no path to a U.S. merchant account.
The open version has no date. HKDAP is the one built for a public chain, the kind of setup that could eventually cross borders. Its retail release is exactly what Anchorpoint won't schedule.

For the U.S. rules, see our explainer on what the GENIUS Act stablecoin law means for merchants.

What This Means for U.S. Merchants With Hong Kong Buyers or Suppliers

E-commerce stores and marketplaces selling to Hong Kong shoppers. Hong Kong buyers who start using RedCoin can spend it at Hong Kong merchants that accept PayMe. Your U.S. checkout isn't part of that network, and there's no announced plan to change that. If you want to accept stablecoin payments from Asia, the realistic near-term route is a U.S. dollar stablecoin through a provider that converts it and settles to your bank. Our guide to how USDC settlement works for merchants walks through that setup. For most stores, though, the bigger gains right now come from card approvals on overseas orders. Read up on local acquiring vs. cross-border processing before you think about tokens.

B2B and wholesale buyers paying Hong Kong suppliers. The institutional HKDAP matters most here, because it already serves qualified businesses. At some point a supplier may ask to be paid in a Hong Kong dollar stablecoin. Treat that as a banking and treasury decision, not a checkout one. Your bank and your accountant need to be part of it, and so does your sanctions screening. U.S. sanctions rules apply whatever the payment method, so the steps in our guide to OFAC sanctions screening for online sellers apply to stablecoin payees too.

Travel and tourism businesses serving Hong Kong visitors. Visitors from Hong Kong will keep paying you with cards and mobile wallets. At launch, RedCoin works for transfers and merchant payments inside PayMe, in Hong Kong. This week's news doesn't change how a U.S. hotel, tour operator or travel business takes payment.

A three-question test before you build on any new payment rail. Is it live for your kind of customer today? Can money on it actually reach your account, or is it stuck inside one app? Does your processor or bank offer it under a signed agreement with stated fees? If any answer is no, put it on a watch list, not a roadmap.

Here's how this week's tokens score. For U.S. sellers, RedCoin fails the second question. Retail HKDAP fails the first. A B2B buyer might get institutional HKDAP past the first question, but only if both your bank and your supplier's bank support it, which neither side has announced. To weigh other options beyond cards, see our guide on whether to go multi-rail as new payment rails catch on.

Questions to Ask Your Processor About Stablecoin Settlement

If a processor or gateway pitches stablecoin acceptance, ask for these answers in writing:

Which stablecoins and blockchains do you support today, and which are only on the roadmap?
Who holds the coins between the customer's payment and my payout, and under what license?
When do U.S. dollars land in my bank account, and who sets the conversion rate?
What's the all-in cost per sale, including conversion spread, network fees and any payout fee? Compare the total against your effective processing rate on cards.
How do refunds work? Stablecoin payments are push transfers, so card chargeback rules don't apply. Ask how you'd send money back and how disputes get handled.
What records will I get for bookkeeping and tax reporting?
Can I hold a balance in a foreign currency, or does every payment convert to U.S. dollars at settlement?

Vague answers to questions 1 through 3 tell you the product isn't ready. Tax and regulatory treatment of digital assets is still changing, so treat this as general information and confirm the details with a qualified accountant or attorney.

What to Do Now: Watch, Don't Rebuild Your Checkout Yet

Pull last year's sales and supplier payments tied to Hong Kong and the wider Asia-Pacific region. If the amounts are small, set a reminder to check back and move on. If they're significant, fix what you can fix today: approvals on cross-border cards, local-currency pricing, and how you settle. A multi-currency merchant account lets you settle in a foreign currency instead of converting every sale. MannyPay's international payment processing team reviews multi-currency acceptance, cross-border acquiring options, and whether U.S. dollar or local-currency settlement suits your volume.

Keep an eye on three things. First, a written retail date from Anchorpoint or one of its licensed distributors. Second, HSBC's planned move of RedCoin into its Hong Kong banking app by the end of 2026. Third, any announcement that RedCoin or HKDAP can move between institutions instead of staying inside one app. That third one is the real signal for U.S. sellers, because that's when a Hong Kong dollar stablecoin starts to look like a payment rail and stops being a feature inside someone else's app. If your Asia-Pacific volume is already big enough to matter, request a free quote and a MannyPay specialist will get back to you within one business day.

Sources

About the author

Adrian Reyes

Adrian Reyes is Senior Payments & Fintech Editor for Beyond the Swipe, covering credit card processing, merchant accounts, payment technology and processing fees.

This article is for general educational purposes and is not legal, tax or financial advice. Card network rules and state laws change; confirm current requirements for your business.