{"id":607412,"date":"2026-09-06T06:32:21","date_gmt":"2026-09-06T06:32:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/607412\/"},"modified":"2026-09-06T06:32:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-06T06:32:21","slug":"why-chelsea-football-shirts-are-making-hong-kong-fans-nervous-about-crypto-laws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/607412\/","title":{"rendered":"Why Chelsea football shirts are making Hong Kong fans nervous about crypto laws"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>English Premier League football club Chelsea\u2019s lucrative new front-of-shirt sponsorship deal with a <a target=\"_self\" class=\"e1yy41x40 ef9u0v01 css-1ankfgb ecgc78b0\" href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/topics\/stablecoins?module=inline&amp;pgtype=article\" title=\"\" data-qa=\"BaseLink-renderAnchor-StyledAnchor\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">stablecoin<\/a> issuer has left Hong Kong fans and retailers concerned about whether wearing or selling the top counts as illegal promotion under digital currency laws.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Chelsea signed the deal with Circle to feature its USDC stablecoin brand on player jerseys for the 2026-27 season in late August, just three months after the UK\u2019s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) warned Premier League clubs about partnering with unauthorised crypto and finance businesses.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Circle\u2019s UK arm, Circle UK Trading, is an FCA-regulated company providing certain financial services. But USDC is not issued or regulated under the laws of the United Kingdom, nor is it distributed by a licensed stablecoin issuer in Hong Kong.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Only two stablecoin issuers are currently licensed in Hong Kong \u2013 Anchorpoint Financial Limited and HSBC.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Ahead of the enactment of the Stablecoins Ordinance on August 1, 2025, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) warned on its website that \u201cit will be illegal for any person to \u2026 actively market the issue of unlicensed [fiat-referenced stablecoins] to the public\u201d.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Winnie Choi, a Chelsea fan of 12 years, was among those worried about breaking the law.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cAfter looking up the law, I still do not understand whether it is a problem to wear the jersey,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"English Premier League football club Chelsea\u2019s lucrative new front-of-shirt sponsorship deal with a stablecoin issuer has left Hong&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":607413,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[274955,274954,106368,153287,69490,3448,25059,3470,85,46,153405,274953,235796,154926,105,274957,274956,148637],"class_list":["post-607412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-anchorpoint-financial-limited","tag-bingx","tag-chelsea-fc","tag-circle-internet-group","tag-fca","tag-hong-kong","tag-hong-kong-monetary-authority","tag-hsbc","tag-il","tag-israel","tag-kraken","tag-louis-li-sze-chung","tag-okx","tag-securities-and-futures-commission","tag-sports","tag-stablecoins-ordinance","tag-tanna-chong","tag-usdc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607412"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607412\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/607413"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}