HSBC Begins Phased PayMe Rollout of Licensed Hong Kong Dollar Stablecoin RedCoin for Retail Payments
Oct. 24, 2026 • Article • Digital Assets
HSBC launched its Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin, RedCoin, on PayMe on October 23, 2026, beginning a phased rollout for person-to-person and merchant payments. PayMe has 3.3 million existing accounts, but that figure is not the number of RedCoin users: customers must opt in to activate a stablecoin wallet as access becomes available.
Issued by The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited under a Hong Kong Monetary Authority stablecoin licence, RedCoin is pegged one-to-one to the Hong Kong dollar and backed by segregated liquid reserves. It runs on HSBC’s permissioned distributed-ledger network, and PayMe balances will not be transferable to stablecoin wallets in HSBC’s main mobile banking app. HSBC plans to add wallets to that app before the end of 2026, enabling instant settlement for tokenized money market fund investments starting at HK$100. Later phases are intended to extend RedCoin to corporate and institutional settlement.
HSBC launched its Hong Kong dollar-backed stablecoin, RedCoin, on PayMe on October 23, 2026, opening a phased retail rollout for person-to-person and merchant payments. The launch brings a licensed digital payment instrument into an existing consumer app, rather than requiring users to join a new payments service.
PayMe has 3.3 million existing accounts, but that is its addressable account base—not a count of people using RedCoin. Customers must opt in to activate an in-app stablecoin wallet as access becomes available in stages. The distinction matters for assessing the scale of the launch: distribution through a widely used app does not mean all its account holders have activated the product.
How RedCoin Works on PayMe
RedCoin, which carries the ticker RCHKD, is pegged one-to-one to the Hong Kong dollar. HSBC says it is backed by segregated liquid reserve assets, with custody provided by HSBC Digital Assets Custody. It operates on HSBC’s proprietary, permissioned distributed-ledger technology network, not a public, decentralized blockchain. A permissioned network restricts participation, distinguishing the product’s infrastructure from an open network that anyone can join.
For PayMe users, RedCoin remains subject to the same transaction limits, balance caps and know-your-customer, or KYC, verification requirements as standard Hong Kong dollar fiat balances in the app. KYC refers to the identity checks applied to account holders. Using PayMe’s existing banking infrastructure gives HSBC a way to introduce stablecoin payments within a service that already applies those checks, rather than setting aside the stablecoin regime’s requirement that holders be identified and screened.
The initial uses are retail transfers and payments to merchants. HSBC has not presented this stage as a general-purpose digital currency that can be moved freely across its apps. Its product documentation says customers cannot transfer RedCoin between a PayMe stablecoin wallet and a stablecoin wallet in the HSBC HK Mobile Banking App. That separation will remain important when the bank adds another channel: the two wallets are not interchangeable, even though both carry RedCoin balances.
Licensed Issuance and Launch Context
The Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation Limited issues RedCoin under stablecoin issuer licence FRS02, granted by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority under Hong Kong’s Stablecoins Ordinance. The licence places the launch within the territory’s stablecoin issuer framework, while the app’s existing identity controls address a separate practical question: how prospective holders are verified before using the product.
HSBC was one of two entities granted initial stablecoin issuer licences by the HKMA in April 2026, from a field of 36 applicants. The other was Anchorpoint Financial, a joint venture involving Standard Chartered Bank (Hong Kong), HKT and Animoca Brands. Those licensing details provide context for the launch; they do not indicate that the other licensee is involved in RedCoin or PayMe.
Before the public rollout, HSBC tested wallet onboarding, token minting and live transfers in an internal pilot involving approximately 100 staff members. The pilot established a narrower operational starting point than PayMe’s full account base. The commercial launch extends availability in phases, with each user still needing to choose to activate a wallet.
Next Steps Beyond Retail Payments
HSBC plans to integrate RedCoin wallets into its primary HSBC HK Mobile Banking App before the end of 2026. That planned addition will introduce instant settlement for investments in tokenized money market funds starting at HK$100, according to the bank’s rollout plans. Tokenization represents an investment on a digital ledger; in this case, HSBC intends to use the stablecoin for settlement, rather than limiting it to retail payments.
The planned mobile banking integration does not change the stated restriction on moving balances between the app and PayMe. Customers considering either channel therefore need to distinguish where a RedCoin balance is held from where the stablecoin is issued. HSBC has also outlined later phases for wholesale corporate and institutional settlement, but those are plans, not uses included in the initial retail launch.
The immediate development is a staged payment rollout under a Hong Kong stablecoin licence. Its reach will depend on users opting in, while the proposed investment and wholesale uses remain subsequent steps in HSBC’s rollout.
Ramp partnered with Stripe and Bridge in July 2026 to deploy stablecoin rails for business bill payments and yield-bearing stablecoin accounts funded through standard fiat bank accounts. The arrangement shows how stablecoins can be incorporated into familiar payment workflows without requiring businesses to fund every transaction with digital assets. The economics depend on more than the cost of moving a token on-chain. Stripe charges merchants 1.5% for stablecoin checkout transactions, versus its standard card-processing fee of 2.9% plus $0.30; neither figure establishes the price of Ramp’s bill-payment service. Businesses receiving fiat may also face foreign-exchange and off-ramp costs, typically 0.3% to 2.0% when converting into local banking systems. Domestic clearing networks and compliance checks remain part of end-to-end delivery. Bridge’s issuance and transfer tools, alongside its conditional U.S. trust-bank approval, illustrate the infrastructure behind those payments—but not the elimination of every payment cost.
StraitsX has opened onboarding for digital payment token providers across more than 100 markets through an expanded card-issuing architecture developed with Visa. Integration documentation published on 26 October 2026 describes a multi-BIN model that combines issuing sponsorship, transaction authorization, compliance screening and fiat clearing. The approach lets participating providers build stablecoin-backed card products while merchants continue to receive conventional fiat payments through Visa’s network. StraitsX says its card gross transaction value rose 40-fold year on year from Q4 2024 to Q4 2025, while cards issued across Asia increased 83-fold. On-chain issuer telemetry recorded monthly card transaction volume of $310 million to $438 million through October 2026. The company’s stated $6 billion annualized card transaction figure is distinct from its cumulative $70 billion in processed stablecoin volume. StraitsX and Visa have also scheduled demonstrations of agentic payments for November 2026.
ACI Worldwide and Circle announced a pilot on October 27, 2026, involving USDC and connectivity to Colombia’s Bre-B instant payments system. The integration runs through ACI Connetic, a payments orchestration platform, rather than embedding USDC in Bre-B’s central infrastructure. There is no indication that Colombia’s central bank has adopted USDC as a settlement asset for the national network. The distinction matters because ACI also supplies technology for Bre-B’s central directory and real-time clearing engine. Bre-B launched in October 2025 and handled more than 500 million transactions within five months. Connetic is designed to bring traditional payment rails and digital asset networks together without requiring banks to replace legacy core ledgers. ACI says the platform can support other digital assets and liquidity providers, so the pilot does not make USDC its exclusive option. The arrangement tests a vendor-level connection alongside an established public payment system, not a change to that system’s settlement rules.
Ripple received final approval on 26 October 2026 for Ripple National Trust Bank, giving it a federally chartered institution for fiduciary and custody activities. The charter does not authorize commercial deposits or loans, and it does not transfer issuance of Ripple’s RLUSD stablecoin to the new bank. RLUSD issuance remains with Standard Custody & Trust Company under New York State Department of Financial Services supervision. BNY is the primary custodian of the dollar deposits and U.S. Treasury reserves backing the stablecoin. The arrangement separates a federal custody role from state-supervised issuance. It also comes as the OCC implements the GENIUS Act’s stablecoin rules and faces a lawsuit from the Independent Community Bankers of America challenging its authority to grant national trust charters to crypto firms. Ripple has separately announced an expanded partnership with BNY and Robinhood focused on institutional custody capabilities and exploring tokenized trade finance.
Stripe confirmed in October 2026 that it plans to expand its Bridge- and Visa-powered stablecoin card issuing program from 18 initial countries to more than 100 by the end of the year. The planned rollout spans Europe, Asia-Pacific, Africa and the Middle East. It follows Stripe’s February 2025 acquisition of Bridge, whose APIs connect stablecoin transfers with fiat accounts and bank payouts. Stripe has also made Open USD available to businesses in Stripe Financial Accounts alongside USDC. Its broader stablecoin infrastructure combines Bridge’s conversion tools with Stripe’s existing payment and treasury network and embedded wallets from Privy. Lead Bank supports the card program as a financial institution partner and BIN sponsor. A separate deployment by Ramp uses Bridge APIs and Privy wallets to let businesses pay vendors in stablecoins using funds from fiat bank accounts. Together, the developments show how Stripe is assembling stablecoin services for business payments, while the planned geographic expansion remains unfinished.
Project Agorá settled approximately CHF 800,000 in live, multi-currency transactions during a July 2026 testing phase. The work examined a cross-border payment model that places tokenised commercial bank deposits on a shared ledger while holding tokenised central bank reserves on jurisdictional ledgers. Five central banks participated directly in live-reserve settlement, although the project’s wider central-bank group has since expanded to eight with the Bank of Canada’s entry. The project reports an average settlement time of 80 seconds across six currencies and uses smart contracts to run anti-money laundering, sanctions and fraud checks simultaneously. Legal analyses found that tokenisation did not change the underlying character of deposits or reserves in participating jurisdictions. The findings support further work on deposit-based wholesale settlement, but the supplied research does not establish that the approach outperforms stablecoins. The Eurosystem plans to draw on Agorá’s architecture for Projects Pontes and Appia.