{"id":461706,"date":"2026-02-06T06:33:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-06T06:33:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/461706\/"},"modified":"2026-02-06T06:33:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-06T06:33:10","slug":"china-could-challenge-us-digital-asset-lead-via-hong-kong-american-treasury-chief-warns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/461706\/","title":{"rendered":"China could challenge US digital asset lead via Hong Kong, American Treasury chief warns"},"content":{"rendered":"

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he \u201cwould not be surprised\u201d if China is already looking into ways to challenge the US\u2019 pre-eminence in digital assets, given Hong Kong’s efforts to develop the industry.<\/p>\n

When testifying before the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday, Bessent said that there are \u201clots of rumours of Chinese digital assets\u201d possibly being backed by something other than its currency yuan, such as gold, but that the US could not confirm such claims.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t know that for sure,\u201d Bessent said, answering Wyoming Senator Cynthia Lummis\u2019 question about whether China is trying to use digital assets and blockchain to \u201cbuild an alternative to American financial leadership\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a very large sandbox in Hong Kong, and the [Hong Kong Monetary Authority] is actively travelling the world, looking at different mechanisms,\u201d Bessent said. \u201cSo I would not be surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bessent\u2019s comments reflect US President Donald Trump\u2019s goal to make the US the \u201ccrypto capital of the world<\/a>\u201d and to prevent China from becoming competitive in the space.
\n<\/p>\n

01:04<\/p>\n

China accuses extradited tycoon Chen Zhi of running transnational crime syndicate<\/p>\n

China accuses extradited tycoon Chen Zhi of running transnational crime syndicate<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he \u201cwould not be surprised\u201d if China is already looking into ways…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":461707,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[237086,64,63,3686,66273,99,512,6198,237083,2490,164,10340,105543,16740,237085,2489,75141,237084,65279],"class_list":["post-461706","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-american-financial-leadership","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-beijing","tag-brian-armstrong","tag-business","tag-china","tag-coinbase","tag-digital-asset-market-clarity-act","tag-donald-trump","tag-economy","tag-hong-kong","tag-hong-kong-monetary-authority","tag-scott-bessent","tag-senate-banking-committee","tag-us","tag-us-treasury-secretary","tag-wyoming-senator-cynthia-lummis","tag-yuan"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461706","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=461706"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/461706\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/461707"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=461706"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=461706"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=461706"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}