Approval of Hong Kong warehouses hailed

Secretary for Financial Services & the Treasury Christopher Hui welcomed the move by the London Metal Exchange (LME), a wholly-owned subsidiary of Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing, to approve the first three applications to establish recognized warehouses in Hong Kong.

The LME included Hong Kong as an approved delivery point within its global warehousing network in January this year, and began accepting applications from warehouse operators to become approved storage entities of LME-registered brands of metals.

The endorsed applications involve four warehouse facilities.

Mr Hui said on April 15: “The approval of the first batch of applications in merely a few months indicated the efforts of the Government and the industry in exploring new growth areas, and allowed LME-approved warehouse operators and local warehouse operators to begin the process of establishing operations early.”

Noting the Chief Executive’s emphasis of the need to explore new growth areas in his 2024 Policy Address, Mr Hui highlighted that the establishment of a commodity trading ecosystem is a new growth point to consolidate and enhance Hong Kong’s status as an international financial center.

“The establishment of LME-approved warehouses in Hong Kong will provide convenient, cost-effective and safe delivery channels for metals trading in the region.

"This will not only attract relevant enterprises to establish a presence in Hong Kong, turning our city into an operation center for international commodity trading, storage and delivery, shipping and logistics, risk management, but also promote the development of related financial transactions such as futures, thereby injecting new impetus into consolidating Hong Kong’s status as an international financial center.”